


It's not a Bug - it's a Feature

by Rei



Category: Social Network (2010)
Genre: Angsty Schmoop, Dustin's T-Shirts, Fix-It, Friendship, Geekiness, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Mark's ~feelings, Reconciliation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-22
Updated: 2011-11-25
Packaged: 2017-10-26 10:44:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 42,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/282135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rei/pseuds/Rei
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“<i>If my name were Vista – would let me crash at your place tonight?</i>”<br/>Somewhere in the midst of Twizzlers, coding sprees, smoking weed, non-disclosure agreements and surviving life after the depositions Mark and Dustin start to become friends with more than benefits. No strings attached of course, because Mark doesn't do relationships. But when Wardo comes back into his life, things start to get complicated ... and seriously? There are too many feelings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. You and I would add up better than a Riemann sum

**Author's Note:**

> Beta: suthnoli and oflights - all mistakes left are mine. You guys rock so hard. ♥

When Mark wakes up, it’s dark outside.  
For a second he feels like floating, strangely disconnected from reality and he TAKES a moment to realise THAT the Star Wars poster ON the other side of the room looks distinctly familiar. Palo Alto. And judging to the poster he’s in Dustin’s room, lying on Dustin’s bed, still fully clad in jeans, but without a t-shirt.

Mark sits up slowly and scrubs a hand across his face. He vaguely remembers walking up here from the living room to ask Dustin something…about something. Probably something php-related, he isn’t sure. He must’ve passed out on the bed.  
Someone (there are not too many suspects, really) has taken off his shoes and thrown a blanket over him, which is an oddly considerate gesture. It doesn’t quite fit in with their small community, which consists mostly of bongs and coding sprees, computer geeks, beer pyramids and Twizzlers.  
It is something Wardo would do.  
 _Would have done_ , a tiny voice whispers in Mark’s head. Mark isn’t sure anymore when it comes to Wardo, not since he refused to come out here, no matter how much Mark had reasoned with him.  
 _Begged_ him to, the same voice mockingly corrects him and he squashes it down.

Still not feeling very awake and certainly not back in reality, Mark snatches one of Dustin’s t-shirts with the silly logos (this one says ‘ _Life is too short for 56k_ ’) and stumbles out of the room and down the stairs.

Downstairs, everything is quiet. The TV is still running, but the lights are dimmed and the living room is empty, except for Lee and Matthew who are wired-in and completely ignore him as he walks past them. Mark passes the kitchen, curious. It hasn’t been quiet here for a while with all the people running around this place. But there is no sign of Sean or his nameless pretty girls, the other programmers or the random people who keep showing up to have a drink, play some Halo or jump into the pool. Sometimes Mark suspects they aren’t really friends of anyone in the house, just random college students or neighbor kids who knocked on their door to see if anybody would dare to kick them out. It’s something he would do.

He feels hot and dizzy, and the humid air inside doesn’t help to clear his head. He should go back to work, he thinks, there’s still so much to do, but for once in his life he doesn’t feel like coding. He feels as if his eyes are going to pop out of his head if he has to look at a screen right now.  
What he needs is some fresh air.

The swimming pool is illuminated and glows bluish in the darkness. It’s empty except for one lonely figure.  
Dustin sits on the edge, bare legs dangling in the water. He wears shorts and a t-shirt; both are soaking wet. He has his head tilted back and his eyes are closed, and between his lips is a cigarette; the glowing tip pointed at the night sky. From the way it smells, Mark identifies it as a joint.

“Ma~rk,” Dustin says without opening his eyes. He sounds dreamy and relaxed. “Hey. Mark.”

Mark makes a non-committal noise and sits down beside him. The cool water feels pretty amazing around his bare feet.  
“How late is it?” He squints at the sky that is still black but already has the softest tinge of grey and yellow around the edges. “Or how early?”

“Four, I guess,” Dustin replies after a moment of deep contemplation and takes the joint between two fingers. “Maybe five. It’s either Tuesday or Wednesday. Not sure about that, though. My sleep-wake-cycle is completely shot to hell,” he sighs and rubs a hand across his eyes.

Mark doesn’t know either, but it doesn’t really matter anyway. Time lost its meaning somewhere between coding and programming, being wired-in and being drunk and _creating_.  
Dustin’s skin is warm and moist where their bare arms touch. He looks as if he has been swimming fully clothed, but his hair is still mostly dry, so maybe he hasn’t.

“Slept well?” Dustin asks casually and takes another drag from the joint.

Mark nods and changes topics somewhat uncomfortably. The smell of Dustin’s bed seems to linger in his clothes. “Where the hell is everybody?”

“Sean took them out to some ‘awesome’ party in the Valley a few hours ago. Rumor has it that there’ll be strippers. So I don’t think they’ll be back soon.”

“Why are you still here?”

“Somebody had to stay and torture the newbies. I felt it’s my duty to this country.” Dustin mock salutes, joint between his lips and looking decidedly non-patriotic.

“I see you’re doing a great job,” Mark deadpans.

“Shut up.” Dustin smiles good-naturedly. “I’m just having a private party.”

Mark raises an eyebrow and looks pointedly at the joint. Dustin gestures vaguely with one hand. “One of Sean’s girls left a stash of weed in the bathroom. I figured if she didn’t need it…”  
He doesn’t complete the sentence.  
His bare legs move languidly under water. Mark watches the rippling surface quietly, feeling oddly detached and dreamlike. It always feels like this when he has spent too much time in front of his laptop, has been out of the real world for too long with not enough sleep and too much caffeine buzzing through his veins.

“Want some?” Dustin offers. “You look as if you could use it.”

Mark doesn’t usually smoke, but he figures why not? Right now he does a lot of stuff he doesn’t usually do. “Sure.”

Dustin scrutinizes him for a long moment. Then he lifts the joint up to his lips and takes a drag, inhales deeply and turns his head toward Mark’s.  
Surprised - and more out of reflex than anything else - Mark parts his lips. He has watched some of Sean’s girls do this before, and has always wondered what the big deal is.  
Dustin tilts his head and exhales slowly. Their lips almost touch, but not quite; and warm smoke fills Mark’s mouth.  
Mark savors the unfamiliar taste for a moment while he watches him, curiously, questioningly. The tangy, sweet smell of weed hangs heavily in the air between them, and the blue water reflects in Dustin’s eyes.

“Haven’t seen you for a while,” Dustin says somewhat randomly.

Mark feels strangely lightheaded. “That is physically impossible. We live together,” he points out. “You see me every day.”

Dustin’s arm brushes against his own as he shrugs, barely noticeable. “Yeah, but it’s not the same. We’re either wired-in or asleep and never at the same time. And if you’re not wired-in, you’re all over Sean.”  
He says ‘Sean’ with a notable lack of enthusiasm.

“I’m not all over Sean,” Mark replies. He knows he should feel annoyed, because he has repeated this exact sentence way too many times in front of Eduardo, but somehow he isn’t.

Dustin makes a noise that’s a cross between a sigh and a laugh and places the joint between his lips. “’Whatever, dude. Then _he’s_ all over you. He’s like attached to your hip or something, patting your head like you’re his awesome little lap dog.”

“That’s a somewhat insulting metaphor.”

“Well _good_ , because it’s meant to be an insult.”

Mark watches as Dustin’s mouth curves around the tip, the steady hollowing of his cheeks as he inhales. He feels like he’s watching him under a microscope, every detail of his goofy, familiar face magnified a hundredfold and looking different somehow. Different, but still the same.  
“Are you jealous?” he asks on impulse.

“Maybe.” Dustin makes a ridiculously sad little puppy face and Mark can’t help but laugh.

“You’re so full of shit,” he tells him and removes the joint from his mouth and places it between his own lips. It tastes different like that and it feels somewhat lacking.

Dustin shrugs and focuses on the blue water as if it has suddenly become of immense interest to him. “I just…I miss you.”

Mark frowns because Dustin is not making any sense. “I’m right here.”

One thing is true though, he thinks.  
He can’t even really remember the last time he talked to Dustin, like really _talked_ , and not just exchanged some hasty words in passing or scribbled lines of code on a napkin. This is kind of sad considering they work together, live together, have conjoined rooms and more often than not have passed out on each other’s bed. But right now he doesn’t even remember when the last time he has consciously looked at Dustin’s face was.  
There’s always somebody else who wants something and there’s always something happening that needs to be dealt with. And there’s Sean, who does take up a lot of Mark’s time.

This used to be their baby. It used be their shared dream, the one normal people like Chris and Wardo always supported but never quite got, never quite understood, not the way Dustin understands it. Not the way Dustin always understands _him_.  
He remembers nights in Harvard spend next to each other, drunk and coding and toying with impossible ideas that seem less and less impossible now; more tangible with each day they work.

While he has constantly missed Wardo during the last weeks, he hasn’t even realized that he kind of misses Dustin, too. Dustin, who is right here.

“Your idea with the wall,” he says slowly and inhales, “While it’s still lacking details and fine-tuning and could definitely use some improvement…its good.”

“So you like it?”

“I like it.”

Grabbing Dustin’s shirt, he leans forward and pulls. Dustin laughs breathlessly and tilts his head. Mark exhales and Dustin inhales and they do it in almost perfect synchronization, and this time their lips _do_ touch. It’s the barest of contact, but it makes his breath hitch in his throat for a second, and even more embarrassingly it makes him think jumbled, incoherent thoughts. _So that’s what this is about._

He feels bold and reckless and almost lighthearted. It must be the effect of the joint kicking in.

Wardo is being difficult and Sean is being an ass, the girls get on his nerves and the newbies are mostly useless, none of the companies wants to work with them, they just don’t realize how cool the Facebook is, and he’s too tired, too wired, exhausted, frustrated, annoyed, but for the first time in weeks, he feels as if he can breathe again. And he thinks _I can have this_.  
Just this. Just now.

“My ideas are _always_ great,” Dustin whispers confidently. His face is so close that Mark can see his widened pupils and the dusting of tiny, golden freckles across his nose.

“I didn’t say it was _great_. I said it was _good_. And I mentioned that it could use some fine-tuning.”

“Whatever, dude. What you really meant is that it’s great and I’m absolutely awesome.”  
Dustin smirks and Mark realizes a second too late what he’s about to do. By then Dustin has already pushed him in.  
The water is only waist deep, so Mark manages to save the joint from getting wet, but not much else.  
Dustin slides into the water after him and makes a soft giggling noise that reverberates across the space between them.

“You’re so high,” Mark states.

“I am,” Dustin confirms and moves towards him. The fabric of his too long, black shirt floats around him.

Mark pushes damp curls out of his forehead and watches him. He sucks at the joint, but again it seems somewhat lacking. He stares at Dustin and it feels like waiting. He has always been waiting, he realizes with startling clarity, his whole life, waiting for something special to happen or maybe just for people to realize that _he’s_ special, that he can do bigger and better than they ever thought he could. But it’s happening now, it’s happening here and he’s right in the middle of it.

“It’s happening, isn’t it?” he hears himself say. “Here. Now.”

“Yeah.” Dustin nods. And maybe he only understands what the hell Mark is talking about because he’s high as a kite or maybe it’s because Dustin’s brain is bizarrely wired just like his own.

“It’s moving so fast. Faster than any of us ever thought it would,” Mark adds, feels strangely out of breath.

“It’s going to be a revolution.” Dustin smiles. “It’s going to be awesome and we’re going to be the kings of the universe. You know it’s true.”

“Or enemies of the state.”

“Maybe both.”

Dustin snatches the joint from his fingers and he’s standing too close, too far away, all at the same time. Mark watches his throat bobbing up and down as he swallows, watches his fingers holding the joint, watching his mouth, follows every movement. They circle around each other and Mark feels hyperaware of every little thing Dustin does.

Almost casually Dustin leans forward. They’re about the same height and it feels as if they’re just kind of floating towards each other. Mark meets him halfway and their lips end up pressed together.

It’s uncomfortable at first. The angle is all wrong and their noses bump together again awkwardly. Laughter bubbles in Mark’s throat. Dustin makes an embarrassed little sound and starts to pull back. His cheeks look flushed in the gentle light.

“Sorry?” he tries breathlessly.

“No.” Mark replies. “You’re really, really not.”

“True.” Dustin grabs his shirt and pulls him back. “I’m not.”

And he does it again. This time he readjusts his position and Mark opens his lips encouragingly and all of a sudden everything fits. They’re kissing.  
Dustin’s lips are dry and a little chapped from the way he chews on them all the time. But they’re soft and slightly parted and something warm and thrilled and relaxed sparks in Mark’s stomach.

Dustin makes a pleasant little noise, a mix between a groan and a giggle. “I think my binomials just expanded…” he breathes against his lips and Mark trembles so hard with barely suppressed laughter, he almost stumbles and drowns.

They are standing in a swimming pool in Palo Alto and they’re kissing. It’s weird and wrong and all kinds of awkward and the best thing that has happened all evening.

They end up stumbling across the house to Mark’s bedroom, kissing and giggling, talking code and leaving a trail of wet footprints and soaked clothes on the ground. The joint has drowned in the endless artificial blue of the pool, buried in a grave of nothing but light and waves.  
Lee and Matthew are still wired-in and they probably wouldn’t even notice a herd of horses doing the Macarena in the middle of the living room. At least that’s what Dustin claims.  
Mark doesn’t know and he can honestly say he doesn’t care.

They spend the night smoking too much dope, talking in nothing but code and scribbling messy lines of php and html all over the wall and the bed sheets. They exchange joints and sloppy, lazy kisses and eventually they end up on the floor laughing so hard that Mark feels as if he can’t breathe anymore. He falls asleep with Dustin’s head in his lap.

“That was awkward,” Mark says the next morning, not feeling particularly weird or reproachful, just contemplative. He lays on his bed in nothing but dry boxers.

“I liked it,” Dustin admits. He’s about to change into a fresh t-shirt and his voice sounds muffled.

“You would.” Mark snorts.

Dustin looks over his shoulder and throws a loopy grin at him. “It was cool. Admit it.”

“It was all right.” Mark’s voice is impassive and he doesn’t look at Dustin, but he feels something tugging at the corners of his mouth that tastes suspiciously like a smile.

It’s the best night he had for a while even though Sean’s girl is pretty pissed at Dustin for stealing her dope and Sean makes weird innuendos for awhile that Mark doesn’t really get, but well, who cares. It doesn’t happen again, mainly because he and Dustin are way too occupied with everything that’s happening.

All is good. Facebook grows and grows and it becomes more epic every day, and Mark feels as if he could just do that for the rest of his life, coding and programming, living on Red Bull and Twizzlers and jumping in the pool instead of showering. It’s dizzying, scary and thrilling and everything moves so fast and spirals out of control so fast that he almost doesn’t keep up with it.  
But it’s good.

Until it suddenly isn’t anymore.

And then for a while it is as not-good as it possibly can be.  
It feels like the worst time of Mark’s life.


	2. Interlude: Crash

“Mark,” someone says. “Shit. Mark!”

The voice sounds vaguely familiar, but Mark’s brain isn’t able to fully process that thought.   
Right now his brain isn’t even able to provide his full name.  
His brain crashed. There’s nothing but blue screen.

 _Wardo has broken my brain_ , he thinks and detachedly wonders if this is supposed to be funny. Funny in a cruel ‘irony of fate’-way that’s not even remotely funny, except that it hurts, hurts, _hurts_.   
His brain has been broken by Wardo.   
Smashed to pieces, just like his laptop. Mark can still hear the sound, a sickening crack as if somebody violently broke a skull open, blood and liquid oozing out, all over the floor…   
Not his heart. Obviously. Nothing there to break, right? Wardo has broken his brain.   
That’s even worse. His brain is the only thing he has left. That and a few billion dollars.

Funny, but it doesn’t feel like much right now.

 _‘You told your lawyers?’_

He’s lying somewhere and he’s cold. He’s not sure because his body doesn’t feel quite as attached to his mind as it usually does. Not processing.

“Mark! For Christ’s sake…”

It’s Chris’ voice, Mark realizes dimly.   
Chris is usually a very calm and laidback person, but not right now. Right now he sounds furious. Obviously somebody has done something to piss him off.   
That somebody is _so_ going to regret this, Marks thinks, vaguely amused. Chris might look all preppy and blond and polite, but he can do pissed with the best of them.   
It was probably Dustin.   
Yeah. Dustin. It’s always Dustin.

“Dustin!”

See? There you go.

“Dustin, I found him!”

Found whom? Mark would blink except he can’t remember where his eyes are anymore. Most likely they’re still attached to his head, but he doesn’t like his head very much right now. He’s not on speaking terms with his head. He would laugh at this thought, except there’s nothing left to laugh at. Not anymore.

 _‘I’m not coming back for thirty percent…I’m coming back for everything.’_

“Jesus fucking Christ…Mark. Mark!”

Somebody touches his faces with trembling, surprisingly gentle fingers and he thinks dreamily that this Mark-dude must be in one hell of trouble.   
Oh wait. He’s Mark.   
This can’t be good.

“We need to get him out of here. God! He must’ve drunk the whole bottle.”

“Shouldn’t we call an ambulance?”

“No, we can’t. Look, we…”

“…could be alcohol poisoning!”

“…help me get him up and then…”

“Mark? Mark!”

The voices blur together around him. It sounds funny somehow. Like a cacophony from the album “ _The very Worst of Mark’s life – Special Edition_ ”.

 _‘I was your only friend.’_

And let’s not forget the number one-hit single _‘I was you only friend_ ’. Rewind and repeat, please. Rewind and repeat.

He should laugh. It’s really funny.   
Except he can’t. Maybe Wardo has broken his laugh, too. Wardo has taken everything.   
That’s his last coherent thought. After that Mark doesn’t know anything anymore.

When he wakes up, he’s at home, in his own bedroom and in his own bed.   
He’s curled in on himself, lying on his side and his face smashed into his pillow. His head throbs in rhythm with his pounding heart and when he thinks of moving his stomach rebels loudly, so he doesn’t.   
Everything hurts.   
It’s quiet and the light that spills through the windows is soft and grey. Everything feels a little less real than it used to, a little bit dull and muted, as if his graphics board got damaged in the fall.

He’s not alone though. Someone lies behind him. He feels the soft rise and fall of a chest against his back and there’s a warm hand pressed against his chest. It’s not Chris, because Chris sits sprawled in the chair next to his bed with his head tilted, lips parted slightly and deeply asleep. So it must be Dustin.   
It’s easy, he thinks, to keep track of the people who care about him, when there’s only two of them left.

 _‘I was your only friend’_. Rewind and repeat.

“I know you’re awake,” Dustin’s voice says behind him. He doesn’t move and neither does Mark. He’s too exhausted to confirm or deny anything right now.

“CEO of Facebook dies of alcohol poisoning,” Dustin continues shakily. His breath is warm and moist against Mark’s neck. “Found dead in hotel toilet.”

Mark is quiet. He doesn’t really remember the hotel and certainly not the bathroom, just the bottle of whisky in his hands and how it felt like a particularly good idea at that time.

“Do you _want_ to read that headline one day?” Dustin continues and Mark doesn’t bother telling him that he certainly wouldn’t be able to read it if it were true. “Do you want _your mom_ to read that?”   
His fingers twitch and Mark can feel how they clench at the fabric of his t-shirt as if he’s afraid of what happens to Mark if he lets go.   
He can’t think of his mom. He can’t think anything at all.

Dustin sighs. “Do you know how many brain cells you probably managed to kill with this stunt, you stupid bastard?” he whispers. He sounds as if he actually cares about the condition of Mark’s brain, and who knows, maybe he does. Maybe he does.   
But it doesn’t matter anyway.

“Am I wearing one of your t-shirts?” Mark asks croakily, because the fabric feels unfamiliar somehow and he’s pretty sure he doesn’t own anything in this particular shade of orange. He can feel Dustin nodding.   
“What does it say?”

“It says…,” Dustin clears his throat, but his voice sounds wrong nevertheless, “’ _Just remember if the world didn’t suck, we’d all fall off.’_ ”

Mark closes his eyes. A smile pulls at the corners of his mouth, but it hurts.   
“Wardo broke my brain,” he manages, because that’s the only thing he still remembers. His voice sounds croaky and god awful and it breaks halfway through the sentence.

“No, he didn’t.” Dustin tightens his embrace and he buries his head in Mark’s hair. “I promise, he didn’t.”

There’s really nothing Mark can say to that, so he doesn’t. He just keeps quiet and doesn’t move; and he keeps listening to the pounding of Dustin’s heart against his back, because it’s better than the screaming silence in his head.

“Can you try not to do that again?” Dustin asks shakily.

Mark sighs and closes his eyes. It’s not really an answer, but maybe Dustin realizes that’s all he’s going to get, because he stops talking after that. But he doesn’t let go and Mark falls asleep with Dustin’s fingers splayed across his chest, safely securing a heart that people doubt even exists.


	3. I’m attracted to you like the Earth is attracted to the Sun - with a large force inversely proportional to the distance squared

Life goes on after the depositions, even though Mark never thought it would.   
He remembers a time when it was pretty much impossible to even _imagine_ a life without Wardo by his side, but here he is. Life is still happening and he’s still here. He’s still functioning.   
He can’t say he’s exactly happy, but he’s still here. That counts for _something_ , right?

Chris isn’t exactly happy with him either after the whole alcohol-debacle. He disapproves very much and he forces employees to spy on Mark (and even though he calls it ‘looking after him’, it’s still spying). He’s just angry and probably worried, Mark can tell, but at least he’s still talking to him.

Dustin kind of…isn’t.

Oh, he talks to him all right, but he’s not really _saying_ anything.

He still sends him emails with updates, but his messages don’t have random smileys anymore and no improper links to not work-safe websites. And he doesn’t leave stupid post-its anymore on Mark’s screen.   
He still says ‘yes’, ‘no’, ‘hi’ and ‘bye’, but he doesn’t talk about food that looks like Elvis, political statements in World of Warcraft or the significance of Leia’s bikini for emancipation or, you know, any of his usual topics.   
Mark never knew he could actually _miss_ Dustin’s pointless rambling, but when it suddenly isn’t there anymore he realizes that he does.

Maybe it’s just easier missing this than missing Wardo.   
Because missing Wardo _hurts_.   
It hurts in a way that makes breathing, thinking, working and functioning impossible, so he tries not to do it too often.

Missing Dustin is more like…like a little nagging voice at the back of his mind that reminds him something is wrong. Something is supposed to be different. It’s annoying.   
He remembers Dustin telling him ‘ _I miss you_ ’ in Palo Alto and his bewildered answer ‘ _I’m right here_ ’ and Dustin’s sad little sigh because Mark just _doesn’t get it._   
He gets it now.

Dustin is here, but he’s not really here. And somehow that makes Mark miss him even more.

Dustin probably hates him for what he did.   
Of course. Why wouldn’t he? After all, everybody kind of hates him for what he did. When they assume he doesn’t pay attention, even his most dedicated employees look at him in a way that seems puzzled, confused and wary somehow. ‘Wary’, as if they expect him to fire them in a blink of an eye if they’re not careful enough. A constant reminder of _‘how could you do that?’ ‘What kind of person does that to his best friend?’_

Chris and Dustin are still here, but sometimes he wonders how much longer they’re going to stay. Chris is angry at him and Dustin is obviously avoiding him. Apparently pushing Wardo out of his life has meant pushing everyone else out as well.

 _You wanted to be CEO more than you wanted to be anybody’s best friend, a voice reminds him in his head. Stop complaining. You got your wish._

He is CEO now.   
Facebook is becoming bigger than he ever imagined it could. And it’s all his. He’s at the top of the world.   
That’s what he wanted, right?

 _‘We’re going to be the kings of the universe and you know it.’_

He remembers this sentence a lot and he remembers Dustin’s happy, carefree, doped up smile as he said it. It doesn’t feel like this anymore.

Things change, though, in a way he had never expected.   
They change after one of the bigger Facebook technical conferences.   
Mark hates these kinds of meetings, because even though outwardly it’s supposed to be about work, it really, really isn’t. It’s about socializing and sucking up to potential new investors and making small talk; all things Mark is positively dreadful at. Nobody wants to talk about programming or the new features he has planned for Facebook and it’s all about money and connections and _‘how nice to see you, by the way are you planning to invest another million dollars, because, you know, that would be really neat’._

Chris makes him go to these things, because he insists that it’s important, and maybe he’s right. Chris usually knows what he’s talking about and that’s exactly why Mark pays him ridiculous amounts of money for his work.   
That doesn’t change the fact that halfway through the miserable ordeal he already feels as if he’s about to gouge his eyes out with a cocktail spoon if he has to keep smiling and being nice to people who are so stupid that it _hurts!_

He flees.  
Chris says fleeing is okay if he can’t help it. Being honest, he claims, is _not_ an option because people consider Mark impolite or rude when he’s honest and then they won’t work with Facebook and that’s obviously a bad thing for all of them. But fleeing is okay.   
So that’s what Mark does.

He ends up outside, in the backyard.   
When he bought the building he hadn’t even realized at first that the massive woodland behind it was included. He assumes it’s supposed to be a garden, _‘supposed to be’_ being the operating phrase here. It’s huge, gone wild, and it resembles a jungle. Mark hasn’t really figured out what to do with it yet, so it’s just sort of _there_ , growing and growing and not really adding anything, but not being a bother either. It’s just…there.

He’s not the first person to have beaten a retreat, although that isn’t surprising.  
He isn’t the only person in the company known for being not fond of events like this. Dustin sits cross-legged on the ground with his back to the wall. His t-shirt is blue and says _‘Software is like Sex. It’s better when it’s free. :)_ ’ An almost untouched beer stands next to him. He looks worn-out, lost in thought, and it takes him longer than usual to notice Mark’s presence.

“Oh. Hi.” Dustin waves a little, eyes following Mark uneasily as he approaches curiously. “I, uhm…don’t tell Chris I’m here, okay?”

Mark slides down the wall to sit beside Dustin. “I won’t. Don’t tell him either.”

Dustin nods. “Cheers to that, I guess.”

After that they’re silent for a few tense minutes and Mark can feel Dustin glancing at him every now and then, which seems to be a rather pointless activity. Mark doesn’t glance at people. He knows what Dustin looks like, so what would be the point in staring at him?

Eventually Dustin clears his throat. He has always sucked at awkward silences and Mark draws a bizarre kind of satisfaction out of the fact that at least some things don’t ever change, no matter how much Dustin might hate him by now.   
“Bored out of your skull already?” Dustin asks casually.

“I wouldn’t call it bored as such,” Mark replies after some consideration. “It’s more a feeling of intense detestation paired with an incredible lack of interest and the longing to bang my head against a wall repeatedly. But in case that’s the official definition of ‘bored’, then yes, I guess, I’m really, very bored.”

“That’s actually a very good definition.” Dustin chuckles. “You managed to insult anybody yet?”

Mark sends him a scathing look. It’s not as if he _tries_ to insult people on purpose. It just sort of happens. “No.”

“Well, at least that would’ve been kind of exciting.” He pauses. “But…don’t tell Chris I said that.”

Mark is quiet again, because he doesn’t really know where this is going and why Dustin is being so amicable all of a sudden, when he barely took notice of him during the last few weeks.

Dustin picks aimlessly at the label of his bottle.   
“Nice out here, isn’t it?” he says eventually.

Mark frowns. “Are you making small talk? Why? Don’t. I hate small talk. It’s pointless and ineffective and it’s always about stuff nobody has anything interesting to say, like the weather or the food or the surroundings.”

“I wasn’t,” Dustin defends himself. “I’m just stating a fact.”

“Stating a fact is pretty pointless, too, because if it is a fact it means everybody knows it anyway. So why would you bother saying it?”

“Oh, I’m pretty sure you didn’t know it. You never see what’s right in front of you,” Dustin mutters back and Mark raises his eyebrows in surprise.

“Don’t I?”

Dustin shakes his head and sighs. “Well, _sometimes_ you don’t,” he modifies. “Sometimes you’re really dumb for a supposedly smart person.”

“Thank you.”

“I’m just saying…it is nice here. This.” He gestures vaguely with his right hand. “It might not be perfect, but I like it this way. And I’m glad you didn’t get around to paying gardeners to turn this into some kind of still-life yet.”

“You prefer the jungle.”

Dustin nods defiantly. “It’s more, you know, romantic.”

“Romantic.”

“Hey, don’t laugh. It’s true. It’s like the perfect place to make out. If we would…I mean if _somebody_ would make out here, it would be really cool. Like in a movie. But of course we’re not making out,” Dustin adds hastily.   
His face is just so damn close and his cheeks are flushed.

“No,” Mark states calmly.

“‘Cause that would be awkward,” Dustin agrees and plays with his fingers.

Mark nods. “Totally awkward.”

And then he leans forward and Dustin meets him halfway and their lips end up pressed together.  
It’s almost a kiss, but not quite. It’s very different from the ones they shared in Palo Alto, less playful and a lot more sober this time. And it is kind of awkward, but not exactly in a bad way.

At first neither of them closes his eyes. Dustin stares at him defiantly and Mark stares back. Neither wants to back down, neither wants to give in. It feels pretty symbolic for the cold war they’ve had going on during the last few weeks.

Dustin is the first one to relent. He always is. Eventually he sighs deeply and closes his eyes. He lifts his arm and places his hand on Mark’s cheek. It’s an oddly tender gesture.   
Mark parts his lips almost automatically. Part of him is confused, because Dustin didn’t seem to be that fond of him lately, but another part of him thinks – rebelliously - _why not?_  
Why the hell not. He closes his eyes.

Dustin kisses like he codes. He doesn’t have what one would call a refined technique, but he’s enthusiastic and comfortable and he’s very sweet in a way that makes Mark feel special and appreciated. Like Dustin’s whole attention is focused solely on him.   
Then Dustin does something with his teeth and tongue where he nip-sucks at Mark’s lower lip, and Mark stops thinking all together.

It stops all too suddenly. Dustin lowers his hand and leans back. Mark has to stop himself from leaning forward to follow his mouth.   
Dustin’s breath comes out faster than normal and he looks wide-eyed and torn. His lips are wet and shiny and Mark feels oddly out of breathe watching him like that.   
Dustin is a good kisser, even when he’s not high.  
Not that he’d ever tell him.

Mark has no idea if he himself is considered a good kisser.   
It’s probably not something he excels at; at least that he’s pretty sure of. Erica didn’t seem to mind kissing him, but _‘didn’t seem to mind’_ might not exactly be a compliment.

“I should…” Dustin stumbles across the words and clears his throat. “I really should go back inside. Chris is…he’s probably waiting for me. I promised to talk to…I should go.” Without waiting for a reply, he gets up and flees.

Mark watches him go.   
Obviously he isn’t such a good kisser.

*

He figures it was a mistake.   
Maybe Dustin was just bored. Dustin gets crazy when he’s bored and he does stupid things like the one time in Harvard where he tried to convince them it would be a great idea to grow weed in their bathtub and sell it in the Kirkland dining hall.   
For the record, it’s _not_ a great idea.

Anyway, Mark figures it was a mistake.   
Back to business. Back to despising Mark from afar.   
Except that this is not what happens.

A few days later Dustin comes into his office during lunch break.   
He hovers kind of indecisively at the door for a few minutes, before he approaches Mark’s desk. Mark ignores him and keeps typing.

Dustin circles the desk a few times (like a cat circling its litter), before he apparently picks the perfect spot, and sits down on the edge, beside Mark’s keyboard. He folds his hands in his laps and he swings his legs slowly, like he’s contemplating something.   
Mark is till typing.

“Dinner,” Dustin says eventually and he says it in a way he usually reserves for _‘I hacked their firewall’_ , like he’s being absolutely brilliant.

“Already ate,” Mark mutters, absentmindedly.

“You ate breakfast,” Dustin corrects him patiently. “Yesterday. And no. I mean, _dinner_. You. Me. Tonight.”

“What?” Mark frowns, but he doesn’t bother to raise his head, eyes still glued to his screen.

“I’ll pay,” Dustin offers.

That at least gets a reaction out of Mark. He cocks his head, feeling genuinely curious, because seriously, _what?_ “I don’t need anyone paying anything for me,” he reminds Dustin, because Dustin can be a little slow sometimes and maybe he hasn’t really known that before. “I’m a billionaire.”

Dustin throws up his arms in exasperation. “Guess what? I’m a billionaire, too. I don’t even know what to do with all my money.” It’s not even a lie.   
Dustin doesn’t need much to be happy. A laptop, Twizzlers, his friends, and that’s probably about it.

“But, guess what.” Dustin takes a deep breath. “I want to spend it on dinner. With you.”

Mark stares at him.

Dustin sighs, exasperatedly. “I’d _really_ like to hotsync your PDA?” he tries. “If my name were Vista – would let me crash at your place tonight?”

“Are you _geek-flirting_ with me? Why are you geek-flirting with me?”

Dustin smiles a little. “Because otherwise you don’t get it when I flirt with you. In fact you don’t get it when anybody flirts with you.”

Mark rolls his eyes.   
He isn’t stupid, okay? He knows that dinner with two people and one of them paying for both isn’t about food. It’s something people make a big fuss about. And that’s exactly why he doesn’t get it. This. Dustin. Making a big fuss. About him, of all people.   
“Why would you do that?”

“What?”

“Geek-flirting. Having dinner with me. Or, you know, _kissing_ me.” He’s not bitter about the fact that Dustin ran away after kissing him. He’s really not. That would be petty.

Dustin tries to blink and frown simultaneously which looks ridiculous and sort of endearing. “Why wouldn’t I?”

“You don’t like me anymore.”

“What?” Dustin stares at him, open-mouthed. “That’s not… _what?_ What?”

Mark shrugs again and slumps uncomfortable in his chair in a way that W-…some people used to describe as _‘passive-aggressively slouching’_.

“Why would you think that?” Dustin sounds completely astonished.

“Because you behave like I do when I don’t like people. I try to avoid them.”

“I guess…that’s what I have been doing,” Dustin admits. Dustin is nothing if not honest.

“Look, it’s easy, really. You don’t like me anymore since Wardo’s gone,” Mark explains patiently. “You’re not sure if you can forgive me for what I did or if you even want to. It’s fine. I don’t mind. I don’t know why we have to talk about _your_ feelings though. You should know that yourself.”

Dustin gapes at him. “But…what…? That’s not even true!”

“Whatever. Look, I really don’t have time for…”

“That’s not true!” Dustin repeats adamantly. “It was just…difficult for me, okay?”

“ _Was?_ ”Mark repeats.

“Okay, _is_. Yes, I think it’s all pretty fucked up.” Dustin sighs. “It’s not easy for me either, okay? I hate what you and Wardo did to each other. I hate that you made me and Chris feel like we had to choose which of our parents we love more. That was fucked up and shitty and it really sucked. And I hate what you did to yourself. What you still do to yourself,” he adds a little bit quieter.

Mark can feel himself deflate a little.

“I hate what you did, but that doesn’t mean I hate _you_.” Dustin runs a hand through his already messy hair and looks at him, pleading. “We _really_ need to talk about this. Can’t we just have dinner?”

Mark looks at his wide, earnest eyes and can’t help but nod.


	4. Your beauty cannot be spanned by a finite basis of vectors

Having dinner with Dustin is very much different from having dinner with anybody else Mark has ever met. Not different in a bad way, just distinctively Dustin-ish.

Dustin fetches him at 8pm with his car and so far it’s all pretty decent and unsurprising.   
Except for the fact that there’s a huge box of pizza on the back seat, next to a few cans of Red Bull and okay, this is somewhat unusual for a date.

Mark raises an eyebrow. “This is impressive, Dustin, really.”

Dustin beams. “I’m all about being impressive. Now hop in, before the pizza gets cold.”

“So,” Mark asks after they’ve start driving, because he’d like to be clear about a few things. “Is this supposed to be a date? I’m just curious and, you know, I would appreciate a little more input so I can modify my behavior accordingly if it is.”

Dustin throws him a glance. “Mark,” he says patiently. “I created a mix tape for this evening.”

“You did?”

He points at his stereo which is, indeed, playing soft music. “It’s called _‘13 Songs that don’t annoy Mark’_ and it took a lot of time, effort and commitment to find them and put them together. So yes, I think we can safely agree on this meeting being a date.”

“Oh. Okay.” Mark frowns. “But why?”

Dustin shrugs and thankfully keeps his eyes on the road. “We made out. Twice. I figured the least thing I could do is treat you to a pizza. My mum didn’t raise me to be a jerk.”

Mark snorts, because seriously. “I don’t think your mom raised you. You got raised on TV shows that made you think the likelihood of zombies and space aliens attacking us is statistically significant.”

Dustin gasps. “Are you, like, _dissing_ my mom?!”

“I’m dissing your taste in movies.”

Dustin grins, feigning relieved. “Oh. Okay. That’s fine.”

Dustin doesn’t drive them to one of the more or less expensive restaurants or nightclubs in town and even though Mark is surprised he’s secretly glad about it. Dustin drives them out of town and to the hills.   
They drive the rest of the way in silence, but it’s less awkward this time, a lot more comfortable, and the songs Dustin chose really _don’t_ annoy Mark, which is saying something.

They end up somewhere Mark has never been before, a spot on top of the hills, where you can see almost the whole city. It’s very dark and very quiet and when Dustin shuts down the engine, he turns to Mark with an almost self-conscious look.  
“It’s not, you know, exactly glamorous,” he apologizes with a nervous gesture of his hands.

“I’m not exactly a glamorous guy.”

“True.” Dustin plays with the car keys in a way that’s awkward and shy and impossibly endearing. And Mark who never watches people (because, you know, it’s useless when he already knows how they look) finds himself gazing at Dustin.   
“Do you…do you want some pizza?” His voice sounds small. “It’s pepperoni, sweetcorn and mushrooms.”

Mark has a lot more questions and a lot more to discuss, but…that’s Mark’s favorite pizza.   
They used to share it all the time in Harvard. Chris has been an on-and-off vegetarian for the last few years and Wardo is a pizza-purist who feels strongly offended when stuff like sweetcorn blemishes his pizza. So that was the one Dustin and Mark used to share.   
“Yeah, okay.”

Dustin looks thankful, so that must’ve been the right thing to say. “Hey, want to see some stars while we eat?” he asks.

Nobody who knows him would believe it, because he’s so not so the type for this, but Dustin is actually a huge car geek. It’s one of the few things in life (except computer-related gimmicks) he’s willing to spend a lot of money on.   
His car is a convertible, sleek and shiny on the outside but really spacey and comfortable on the inside. They sit cross-legged, opposite each other, on the reclined front seats, the pizza box between their knees. The roof is retracted and the sky above them is velvet blue and endless.

It’s like a real date. Even though it’s _Dustin_ which means it should be nothing but hilarious, except it isn’t. Not much at least. It might even be a little bit romantic, Mark thinks, fondly. Dustin blushes a lot and chews on his lower lip and it’s sort of sweet to see him flustered like that. Mark finds himself watching the pale expanse of his throat, he remembers how his lips tasted against his and he realizes with a surge of surprise how much he _wants_.   
Wants Dustin.

“You’re a guy,” he exclaims, interrupting Dustin midsentence, cutting off his long-winded explanation of why C++ can be a real bitch sometimes. He fully realizes how that may have sounded completely random, but it really has only just occurred to him.

Dustin blinks. “Last time I checked I was, yes?”

“No. That wasn’t a question. It’s …I just realized it.”

“Did you assume I was a girl before?”

“No. Wait.” Mark considers this. “No. I don’t think I had a specific gender in mind when it comes to you. You were just…Dustin.”

“Oh.” Dustin looks crestfallen and slowly lowers the piece of pizza he had been about to eat. “That’s a problem, right? ‘ _Just_ Dustin’ doesn’t sound good. It sounds like ‘just second place’ or ‘just html’ or -”

“I’m attracted to you,” Mark blurts out, because he gets it all wrong and Dustin makes a sound as if he’s choking. Mark pauses and frowns. “I’m not supposed to say any of this during the first date, right?”

“My number of first dates is exactly three,” Dustin squeaks. Hastily he clears his throat. “I wouldn’t know.”

Mark shrugs. “My number of first dates is two and a half, so you win.”

“For real?”

Mark nods. “There was Erica and Sean and-”

“Wait. Wait, wait, wait!” Dustin holds up his hands. “Hold up, hold up! Repeat that, please. You dated _Sean?_ ”

“Well…”

“SEAN? I mean, Sean? Like Sean _‘I’m a douchebag’_ Parker? Sean _‘Have you seen my weed and no she’s completely legal this time, I swear’_ Parker? That Sean?”

Mark raises an eyebrow. “He’s not that bad.”

“Okay, time-out, time-out!”

“Time-out? Seriously? This isn’t baseball, Dustin.”

“Whatever! When? How? Why? And why? I mean _why?_ ”

“He asked me out.”

Dustin gapes at him. “What was I doing at that time? Why didn’t I know about this? Did you travel in some kind of parallel universe?”

“You had a thirty-six-hour-coding-spree and slept for fifteen hours afterwards. You just…missed it.”

“So during these approximately fifty hours you decided it would be a good idea to date Sean Parker and you didn’t even tell me about it afterwards?” Dustin presses his hands against his chest dramatically. “I’m wounded, Mark, _wounded_! How could you _not_ mention this?”

“It didn’t seem like a big deal at that time.”   
It really hadn’t been one. It had happened during a time when everything in Palo Alto was still brand new and exciting and Mark hadn’t known Sean so well. And when Sean wasn’t being unreliable or infuriating, he could actually be quite funny and interesting. And charming. Mark is not a robot, okay? He was just young and stupid and brokenhearted and Sean was charismatic and funny and _there_ , and he was obviously interested in Mark.   
“We ate in a restaurant, he paid. We went to a club, we talked, he wanted to dance, we started to make out, I got bored, he started to laugh, we stopped and we never tried again. I figured I probably just wasn’t into guys. That’s about it.”

“Huh.” Dustin blinks and seems to process this new string of information. “Wait. You got bored?”

“I’m always bored when I’m not in front of a computer. People assure me it’s a huge character flaw.”

“But…you weren’t bored when we made out. Were you? You made, like…serious pleasure noises!”

“I did not.” Mark is taken aback.

“So, you _were_ bored?”

“No.” Mark realizes it’s true as he says it. “No, I wasn’t. I really, really wasn’t.”

“ _Yes!_ I _knew_ it! Pleasure noises.” Dustin looks as if he’s about to high-five himself, which is probably a silly look on everybody.

“I don’t do pleasure noises.”

“You so do.”

“Dustin. Shut up.”

Mark has been afraid that it’s going to be weird, dating somebody he knows as well as he knows Dustin, but it really isn’t. It’s playful and comfortable and it’s easy. Only his head still buzzes every time he looks at Dustin (and he does look) and he realizes again, yes, he _wants_.   
He hasn’t wanted anything in a long time and certainly anything not computer-related. It’s a good feeling.

They eat pizza, they talk and they make out in the backseat of Dustin’s car (which, they discover, is an experience both of them missed out on during high school).   
After Dustin finally drives him back home, he absolutely can’t be persuaded _not_ to accompany Mark to his doorstep.   
“I accompanied all my dates to their respective doorsteps,” he insists.

“All three of them?” Mark replies and earns a pointy elbow in his ribs.

“You dated Sean Parker. Your argument is invalid!” Dustin buries his fingers in the fabric of Mark’s shirt and gently tugs him closer, before he kisses him goodbye.  
Considering that he hates ‘goodbyes’ with a passion, Mark has to admit that Dustin has a particularly charming way of saying it.

And this is how it starts. How they start.

They’re not, like, _really_ together or anything. Because that would be weird.   
They’re not even having sex. Yet.  
They’re just…making out. Fooling around. Kissing. Sometimes. After work. Or before work. Sometimes even during work but that’s rare because Mark is nothing if not dedicated.   
They order pizza or take out every once in a while, or play with Mark’s XBox. Dustin falls asleep in his bed or on Mark’s shoulder, drooling and making little noises in his sleep. It’s nice. It’s easy. It’s comfortable.   
Dustin starts to leave him silly little Post-Its again; they’re plastered across his screen and his desk and sometimes he finds them on the door of his fridge. And Mark will deny it to his dying day, but every one of the ridiculous little notes makes him smile.  
Somehow it’s like there has been a Post-it-shaped hole in his life that suddenly gets filled again.

Chris finds out about them on a Monday.   
It’s Dustin’s fault. _Of course_ it’s Dustin’s fault. Except not only.

Someone hacks Facebook and Mark is not a happy camper. He hates people hacking Facebook.   
He gets a frantic call in the middle of the night from Dustin, who’s already (or maybe still?) in the office. When he arrives there are a few tired-looking interns crowded around a computer. Dustin sits in front of it, typing with one hand and pressing a phone to his ear with the other. “Yeah,” he mutters. “No, already tried that. Oh wait, Mark is here. I’ll call you back.”

He doesn’t turn away from the computer, but he flings the phone on the table and reaches over his shoulder for Mark’s t-shirt to pull him closer. “Glad you’re here,” he says and tilts his head back to look up at him.   
“What’s going on?” Mark frowns at the screen and leans over Dustin’s head to get a better look.

“It started around midnight…” Dustin explains the problem in a few precise sentences (when it’s about coding, he can actually make it short, except he still uses sound effects to accompany his explanations) and Mark sits down next to him and listens attentively.   
Halfway through he notices the interns aren’t looking at the screen as often as they should; instead they are staring inconspicuously at them. Mark follows their look, but doesn’t discover anything unusual. Yes, he realizes that he and Dustin sit awfully close and their knees keep touching. But that’s not really remarkable for people who used to share a dorm room and invade each other’s bed all the time. But then Dustin reaches out and pulls at one of Mark’s short little curls to get his attention and Mark…kind of gets it.

He glares at the interns. “If you’re here because you’re hoping for a sleepover-party, I have to disappoint you. Don’t you have work to do?”

“Be nice,” Dustin says. “They’re merely appreciating my genius. As will you when I show you what I did here…”

Mark rolls his eyes. He doesn’t exactly verify it (although he doesn’t deny it either), but Dustin is truly amazing beyond words and within a ten-hour-coding-spree they manage to recoup their losses. The interns come and go, some fall asleep at their desks, but Mark and Dustin stay and work until the sun rises and the site is back up and running.

“It works! Does it work? It works, right?”  
“Wait, wait, wait!” Mark shushes him.   
They’ve been typing and coding alternately and now they’re waiting, huddled together in front of Mark’s computer, starring at the screen. Dustin grabs his hand like he’s an anxious dad watching his kid take the first steps, and Mark queezes back.   
It does work.

“Look at this!” Dustin beams. “We did it. We did it!”  
Mark smiles. “We did.”   
Dustin makes a whooping sound and throws his arms around Mark. Mark puts up with it, because he’s used to suffer like that.   
“We’re awesome,” Dustin states. “You’re awesome. Am I awesome?”

And then Mark has to kiss him, because he kind of is.   
It just feels right.   
Dustin makes a funny little noise of surprise, before he rather enthusiastically reciprocates. In Dustin’s case, enthusiastically means he slides onto Mark’s lap so he has better access to his mouth, his legs dangling left and right from the chair. He’s about the same height and weight as Mark so he’s not that heavy, but despite that Mark complains about holding him anyway.

“You’re heavier than you look, you know?”

“’m not!” Dustin grumbles against his lips. “Don’t diss me, I’m awesome. Computer techs have skilled fingers, if you know what I mean.” He wiggles his eyebrows in a way that is probably supposed to be sexy, but instead looks completely hilarious. “How about we go home and you…handle my exception?”

“How about you stop talking right there?”

All is well, except Mark kind of… _might_ have forgotten that his office has glass walls.   
Whoops.   
It happens, okay?

Somebody knocks at the wall of his office.   
It’s Chris. Of course it’s Chris. Nobody else in this house would have the balls to knock on him.   
Chris is staring at him though the glass wearing a look that Mark hasn’t seen for a while. It’s the look that says _‘Oh Jesus fucking Christ, Mark. Seriously? Seriously?’_

Of course that’s not what he says.   
“So,” he states calmly.

“What?” Mark would be annoyed about how defensive he sounds, but right now he can’t bring himself to care. Chris might look all sweet and shy and pretty, but he’s not easily intimidated, not even by Mark, which is pretty inconvenient right now. It would be easier if one sharp look would shut him up the way it does a lot of other people.

“Christopher.” Dustin waves at him a little awkwardly, his arms still around Mark’s neck. “Fancy seeing you here.”

Chris smiles pleasantly. “I work here, Moskovitz.”   
Then he turns around and throws all the gaping interns a scalding look. “There’s nothing here to see. Keep moving. Go home.” Turning back to Mark he asks, casually: “Is it the time of year where I have to dig out the non-disclosure-agreements again?”

Non-disclosure. Mark hadn’t actually thought about it until now.   
Is there anything to disclose? Or rather not to disclose?   
What he and Dustin do in their spare time is their business and why would anybody care anyway? They’re just friends. Friends who make out occasionally and spend a lot of time with each other, but still. He doesn’t want people to blow this out of proportion. People always do. People assume they know what’s going on even though they have no idea.

He glances at Dustin, who manages to look contrite and smug at the same time (Mark’s not sure how that’s even possible, but on Dustin it works) and who actually looks happy and content being caught sitting in Mark’s lap, kissing him, and not at all as if he feels the need to explain anything to anybody.   
That’s one of the things he really likes about Dustin.

“No,” Mark spontaneously decides. “No non-disclosure agreements necessary.”

“You mean I’m not your dirty little secret?” Dustin asks grinning and leans back to watch Mark’s face.

Mark rolls his eyes, but shakes his head nevertheless. Dustin just isn’t meant to be anybody’s dirty little secret. Ever.

Chris faces them again and for a second he scrutinizes Mark. Behind him the interns very quickly and very quietly leave the room. It’s probably for the best.   
Eventually Chris nods. “Okay then,” he says, “as you will. Full disclosure.”

Dustin exchanges a look with Mark. “Is it just me, or does that sound bad?”

“It does.”

“Does that mean we have to do a sex tape?” Dustin asks. “Like that hotel girl? One night in Dustin?”

Mark rolls his eyes. “Being rich doesn’t make you Paris Hilton.”

“You!” Chris points at Dustin. “ _This_ is why you suddenly wanted to talk to me about ‘your friend’,” he makes air quotes with his fingers, “having a gay crisis!”

“I didn’t have a gay crisis!” Dustin sputters indignantly.

“You had a gay crisis?” Mark asks.

“I did not!”

“He asked me to kiss him,” Chris informs Mark. Dustin groans and tries to bury his face in Mark’s neck.   
Mark frowns at him.

“It wasn’t like that,” Dustin rambles. “I mean it was, but it was totally different. I just needed to figure out some stuff on my own…but other stuff I couldn’t figure out on my own so I needed someone really trustworthy and really gay and obviously that _had_ to be Chris and…”

“You kissed him?”

“Not the way I kiss you,” Dustin replies, uncharacteristically heated and he instantly proves it, so Mark decides to let it drop.

The next day Dustin hacks both their facebook pages and changes their relationship status so it says “DUSTIN MOSKOVITZ isn’t MARK ZUCKERBERG’S dirty little secret any more”.   
Mark doesn’t even threaten to fire him for it, because, well. It might be silly, but at least it’s true.


	5. Reboot

Mark isn’t particularly surprised when Chris stops by his offices a few days later - not overly enthused maybe, but not really surprised either.

“So,” Chris says.   
He always begins conversations this way when he expects Mark to start talking even though Mark has _absolutely nothing_ to say. Like this time. There’s absolutely nothing to talk about. Nothing.

Mark is quiet for a few minutes. Chris keeps staring at him.

“I’m working,” Mark announces, eventually.

“Well, then stop working.”

Annoyed, Mark looks up, fingers still poised over his keyboard. “What do you want?”

Chris sighs. “Mark, don’t play dumb. It’s wasting my time. You can waste your own time all you want, but since you pay me a horrendous amount of money per hour you absolutely don’t want to waste mine. You know exactly what I want to talk about.”

Mark shrugs and doesn’t bother denying it.

“So,” Chris repeats encouragingly.

“I think it’s absolutely none of your business.”

Chris has the audacity to actually _laugh_ at that. Laugh at _him_.

Mark rolls his eyes at him. This is so immature. Seriously. Just because Chris is Mr. Non-disclosure-agreement who has been there at the lowest points of Mark’s life so far, that doesn’t mean Mark’s private life is his business. “Chris. I’m not sitting here because it’s great fun to stare at a glass wall, I’ve really got work to do. Can we make this quick? What do you want to hear?”

Chris sobers almost instantly. “Why?” he asks and the question actually startles Mark.   
“Why what?”

“Why Dustin? Why now?”

“I…don’t know? What kind of question is that? ‘Now’ is not different from any other time, I guess and as for ‘why Dustin’…” Mark pauses, confused, because he has never even thought about it until now. The answer seems to be in the question. _Because_ it’s Dustin. “I don’t know. Why _not_ Dustin?”

Chris doesn’t look satisfied. “Are you just fooling around or is this…serious?”

“Serious? Like a relationship?” Mark rolls his eyes. “Chris, I don’t do relationships, you know that.”

“You used to.”

“Yeah, but…not anymore. I suck at relationships. You know that. I know that. Everybody knows that. I’m pretty sure if you Google ‘ _Mark Zuckerberg_ ’ the first thing that gets automatically added is _‘…sucks at relationships’_.”

“Actually it’s _‘…is a jerk’_ , but whatever. So, you’re what exactly? Friends with benefits?”

Mark shrugs again. They are friends. There are obvious benefits. Technically the term isn’t wrong, but it doesn’t feel right either.   
“Why do you ask me all this stuff? Has Dustin complained about anything?” He frowns as the thought occurs to him. Dustin never complains about anything. He seems to be happy about the way it is.

“No. No, he hasn’t.” Chris runs a hand across his forehead. “Does Dustin _know_ that? Have you talked about stuff?”

“Have we _talked_?” Mark snorts. “Of course we talk. Dustin talks a lot in case you didn’t notice. He talks all of the time. And yes, occasionally I _do_ listen.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“Chris. We’re just…,” he pauses and searches for a term that doesn’t sound wrong somehow. ”We’re _Mark and Dustin_. We’re always going to be Mark and Dustin.” He’s pretty sure of that, at least. “And yes, we do talk. We’re good. Everything else…I really don’t know what you want to hear.”

“Okay,” Chris says, eventually.

“Is this the point then where you threaten me with bodily harm if I ever hurt him?”

“No. Well…”

“I knew it.” Mark rolls his eyes. “It’s okay. Just get it over with.”

“Contrary to popular belief, Mark, I’m not the mafia. But you two are my best friends and I want to make sure you know what you’re doing. Both of you. Because a lot of the time you don’t and then I have to be the grown-up and take care of the aftermath.”   
Chris smiles at him, almost sadly, and Mark realizes with a start that he actually might not be mad at him. It’s a weird feeling, because he had been so sure Chris would very much disapprove of the whole thing. After all…who would want his best friend to be with Mark _‘the one who kicked his best friend out of Facebook’_ Zuckerberg? Certainly not Chris, who adores Dustin like a little brother.

Sometimes Mark forgets that Chris is _his_ friend, too.

But then Chris says: “Actually, Dustin threatened _me_ with bodily harm if I were mean to you”, which is even more surprising.

Mark blinks. “He did?”

“Well not ‘bodily harm’ per se. Dustin couldn’t hurt a fly. But he threatened to hack my bank account and donate all my money to the Republican Party, which is certainly worse.” Chris pauses, and when he does continue he sounds as if he’s searching for words very carefully. “Dustin is very protective of the people he cares about, you know? So you don’t ever have to worry about him doing _anything_ to harm you or harm Facebook.”

“I know. I know that.” Mark feels small all of a sudden, because he can be an ungrateful bastard sometimes, and sometimes he almost forgets what brilliant friends he has.   
He raises his head, and he can’t help but look through his glass windows across the room, to Dustin’s office.

Dustin doesn’t work. He certainly doesn’t look very productive right now. Instead he’s sitting cross-legged on his desk, staring right back at Mark and Chris with a frown. Apparently he has been observing them the whole time.

Chris sighs. “Please wave and smile at him, so he knows I’m not _doing_ anything to you. Jesus Christ,” he mutters under his breath, “why does everybody assume I’m the mafia?”

That actually startles a real smirk out of Mark.   
Dustin seems relieved. Hesitantly he raises his hand and waves at Mark, like the little dork he is.   
Mark feels a surprising amount of fondness welling up in his chest as he actually waves back.

 _‘Go back to work!_ ’ he mouths and Dustin shakes his head, grinning broadly.

“Nevertheless, you should know,” Chris adds, still looking all calm and Zen and shit, “that _I_ am very protective of Dustin. And I know where you live, where you eat, where you sleep, I know all your insurance numbers, how you hacked Google and the way we outsmarted tax authorities last year.”

“Are you _threatening_ me?”

“I’m just stating the facts.”

Mark stares at him for a long, long moment.   
“You’re really scary, you know?” he eventually says. “And I’m really glad I got you to work for me before Steve Jobs had the chance to find you.”

Chris shrugs and does something he hasn’t done in forever. He raises his hand, fist bumps Mark and smiles. “Not an Apple kinda guy.”


	6. <roar>

They spend another evening on Mark’s couch, kissing and making out, when suddenly Dustin shies away from Mark’s touch and attempts to get up.

“What?” Mark frowns and opens his eyes. He has to look up to him, because Dustin lies on top of him.

“Uhm…” Dustin blushes. He wiggles uncomfortably as if the baggy pants he wears have suddenly become a little too tight. It takes Mark a moment to realize that this is exactly what’s going on.   
Oh.

“You…,” he starts to point out.

“Yeah. I know,” Dustin interrupts him hastily. “It’s fine. I just…uhm…just give me a moment here.” He scrambles back and retreats to the other end of the couch like a skittish kitten where he draws his legs up. His face is still crimson beneath his shockingly orange hair.

Mark props himself up on his elbows and observes him questioningly. “I’m not an expert on anything ‘human relationship-related’,” he doesn’t bother making quotation marks with his hands, because he’s pretty sure that Dustin is able to hear them anyway, “but why are you apologizing? As far as I know, getting a hard-on when you make out with someone is not considered a bad thing.”

“Uhm, no.”

“It’s commonly interpreted as a sign of attraction,” Mark says helpfully.

Dustin laughs breathlessly and waves his hand. “You could say that.”

“But I already know that you’re attracted to me. It’s pretty obvious. You touch me a lot,” Mark lists. “You smell my hair when you think I don’t pay attention. You…”

“Thanks for mentioning it. Gawd!” Dustin buries his face in his hands. “I…I just thought it might make you feel uncomfortable,” he murmurs eventually. “This I mean.”

“Why?”

Dustin sighs and presses the palms of his hands against his eye-sockets. “I haven’t done anything with a guy before. Well, I think I played Truth or Dare before where I had to…doesn’t matter. The thing is I have no idea what I’m doing, okay? Not even the slightest. Except I like what we’re doing…a lot, and I want to touch you a lot and it feels really, very good. But I don’t think you have any idea what you’re doing either. And you haven’t exactly been giving me a lot of signals here that you want to go further than making out, okay? I just don’t…I don’t want you to feel uncomfortable or pressured.”

“I don’t feel uncomfortable.”

“Great.” Dustin nods. “Awesome.”   
He looks still out of his depth though as if he has absolutely no clue what to do next.

“I’m sorry if you’ve been waiting for a signal,” Mark says crisply. “As you probably know I’m not the most forward person and pursuing isn’t exactly my strong suit. Not in this area.”

Dustin nods with his eyes downcast.

“But,” Mark continues, “…in case it’s helpful; you should know that I’m not opposed to…”

“If you were planning to say _‘not opposed to engage in sexual activities’_ , then stop right there!” Dustin orders and runs a hand across his hair. “Jesus fucking Christ. I still have some of my dignity left, okay?”

“I want to,” Mark says instead.

“What?”

Mark glares at him. “To put it in words even _you_ can understand: Since distance equals velocity times time, I want to let velocity or time approach infinity.”

Dustin blinks. “You want to go all the way with me?”

“If you want to put it _that_ way…”

“Oh.” Dustin swallows. “Great. Yeah. Me, too.”

Mark watches him from the other end of his couch. He’s finding himself doing that a lot lately.   
Dustin isn’t exactly what one would call a classic beauty. Not with the pale skin and freckles, the long nose and sharp chin, but right now he looks flushed and disheveled in a very appealing way.   
So maybe Mark doesn’t exactly have a clue what they’re doing either. And maybe he hasn’t exactly sending out the right signals so that Dustin catches on to the fact that Mark isn’t exactly …you know, opposed to doing _more stuff._

But Chris and probably everybody else in Facebook think they’re doing it anyway. So why not? Why not really doing it. Everything else they’ve done so far has been pretty damn good.   
Maybe it’s time to become a little more proactive, he thinks. Proactive sounds good.   
Dustin seems to be as clueless as he is, so it’s only fair.

He sits up and starts to approach Dustin, who eyes him wearily.

“What are you…?” His question gets swallowed by Mark pressing his mouth against Dustin’s.   
Mark figures it’s easier this way, easier than to explain stuff. He sucks at explaining stuff.   
He forces his way on top of Dustin and puts his hands right and left of his head. Dustin parts his lips, probably too surprised to object and his lashes flutter shut almost unconsciously. Mark does the nip-suck thing that Dustin does all the time. (He really likes that nip-suck-thing.) Dustin’s lips are soft and pliant under his own and his hands clench around the back of Mark’s shirt.

When Mark starts to loosen the kiss and pulls back a little, Dustin is staring at him, dazed and slightly unfocused.  
“Oh,” he says breathlessly. “Oh, okay.”

“I take that as a sign of consent?” Mark verifies, just to make sure.

Dustin makes a soft chuckling sound at the back of his throat. “You say the sweetest things, Mark-my-dear. Yes, I consent. Hell yes, do I consent.” He pulls Mark back on top of him and lets his hands wander under Mark’s t-shirt. Mark kisses him again and judging from the surprised little moan Dustin makes, he does a pretty good job.

A lot of the time (when he’s not in front of a keyboard), Mark doesn’t know what to do with his hands. But not right now. Right now, right here, everything feels kind of easy.   
He’s kissing and touching, and his hands are exploring Dustin’s bare skin, which is soft and warm and really nice to the touch. Dustin is all warm and eager and inviting. He squirms and pants beneath him and makes soft, little noises.   
_Pleasure noises_ , he remembers Dustin telling him, a term that seemed pretty ridiculous until now.   
_Pleasure noises_. He decides he likes the sound of that.

Dustin tears impatiently at his t-shirt and Mark starts fumbling with the buttons of Dustin’s pants. It’s probably more clumsy than seductive, but Dustin groans nevertheless, so he’s obviously doing _something_ right.  
“Jesus Christ…,” Dustin murmurs; his fingers clenched tightly into Mark’s shirt. He manages to pull it off of him with a jerk. “Holy Apache server.”

Mark feels the corner of his mouth twitch. “You like that?”

“I like that,” Dustin confirms breathless against his lips. His fingertips run gently across Mark’s spine. “If this were Facebook?” he whispers. “I’d press the shit out of the “like”-button.”

He kisses Mark’s neck and sucks on the sensitive skin right beneath his ears and Mark shivers almost involuntary. He closes his eyes, but his fingers keep fumbling with the buttons. He starts to tear impatiently at Dustin’s pants, which makes Dustin giggle, but eventually he manages to get through.

Dustin stops giggling immediately and makes a guttural noise deep in his throat that has Mark twitching in response. He has never touched another man before so this is a bit of a new experience. The skin is all smooth and velvety beneath his fingertips and he can almost feel the blood pumping as if it’s a second heart, a beating little heart right here in his palm. Mark moves his hand, his fingers, slow at first than steadily faster.   
He has no idea what he’s doing and he figures he’s probably clumsy and awkward, but Dustin doesn’t complain and his breathing becomes faster and faster and he makes all kinds of sweet, little noises.

Dustin starts rambling under his breath and it sounds like “…overclock my processor…fuck…” and doesn’t make any sense at all.   
“Jesus fucking Christ,” he eventually breathes and he jerks beneath Mark’s touch. “Wait…stop…”   
Obediently Mark holds still.

Dustin blinks and tries to catch his breath. His cheeks are flushed with color.   
“I’m sorry,” he grimaces. “I just…gimme a second.”

“I’m not doing anything.”

Dustin laughs breathlessly. “Oh God, you are. You are.”  
He traces soft fingertips down Mark’s bare chest and his stomach and he lingers in front of the zipper of Mark’s jeans, questioningly. Mark swallows.   
Oh. Right. Right.

“I have Googled stuff,” he blurts out croakily, which, he’s sure, is probably the most unromantic thing somebody has ever said during a situation like that.

Dustin smiles broadly as if he thinks this is cute instead of really weird. “Of course you have.” He elevates his head a little and kisses the tip of Mark’s nose and the corners of his mouth. His other hand plays with the soft, little hairs at the back of Mark’s neck.

Mark doesn’t get aroused easily (maybe because a lot of the time he’s distracted by something or another or because he doesn’t find many things or people very appealing), but right now that’s definitively not the problem. He exhales jerkily.

“They talked about using…steady moves,” Mark stutters and only stumbles halfway across the words. _Jesus Christ_ , he thinks. Why can’t he stop talking? God. It’s never been an issue before. But right now he isn’t sure what to do and he isn’t sure how to breathe properly when all air seems to have left the building.

“Sure. Steady moves.” Dustin nods. “But what do you like?” he asks softly.

“Facebook,” Mark blurts out, because his brain seems to have short-circuited. He’s pretty sure that’s not what Dustin was asking. “Programming. Twizzlers. You. Wait. You meant sexually, didn’t you?”

“I kinda did. But, you know, you say the sweetest things.” Dustin moves his hands and Mark can’t stop a soft hiss escaping his lips. “In which order?”

“Alphabetically.”

For a second Dustin looks at him, face flushed, eyes shiny and bright and filled with something akin to fondness. It makes Mark feel hot and uncomfortable.   
Dustin is always so honest, so scarily open and trusting. And he makes it so goddamn easy to be honest, too. It’s somewhat scary, really frightening, but it’s kind of sexy, too. It makes Mark want to say stuff, just because he can. It makes him want to say all the random things running around his head the whole time that normal people think impolite or improper. The possibility is enthralling. Exhilarating. And really, really terrifying.   
Mark closes his eyes, takes a deep breath and another, and when a gentle hand touches him again he exhales shuddering.

“I…I didn’t think I’d be your type,” Dustin says, almost in awe.

Mark opens his eyes again. “I like redheads.”

“You do?”

Mark leans forward to kiss him and says: “I really, really do.”

*

The next day Mark gets a short message from Dustin’s computer:  
“ _Would you like to grab a coffee later?_ ”

“ _No time_ ,” Mark types back.

Not even a second later he gets another message. “ _Would you like to grab a_ _coffee_?”

Mark’s eyebrows shot up. “ _Are you trying to dirty code-talk?_ ” he types back.

“ _Does it work?_ ” is the instant reply.

“ _…maybe._ ”

“ __”


	7. The only living Heart Donor

Mark loves almost everything about his job.   
And even though he doesn’t really care about the whole money he makes, it clearly has its perks.   
Dustin and Chris make him spend a lot of it on all kinds of social and environmental projects, because they’re all about caring and saving the planet and hungry children and koalas and recycling. Well, Chris is all about social change and political movements and third world-countries and Dustin is all about cute little animals dying (“ _Mark, they lost their mom!_ ”), so they work pretty well together. Mark guesses that’s fine and it’s not as if he ever really knows what to do with all the money. And koala-babies really _are_ pretty damn adorable.

On Dustin’s birthday, Mark rents a movie theater and organizes a 12-hour Star Wars-movie marathon just because he can. And to see Dustin smile.

He watches Dustin beam at the guests from a distance. It’s only friends and employees and a lot of them are actually wearing a costume, looking completely ridiculous (seriously, Mark really has to start reconsidering the kind of people he employs). Dustin gets hugged and squished from half a dozen people, before he manages to fight his way over to where Mark stands.   
“This… you…!” he gasps. “This is so awesome!” He jumps at Mark and Mark blinks and makes an ‘umpf’ sound. That wasn’t exactly planned.   
Dustin wraps his arms around his neck and presses a kiss to his mouth. This wasn’t planned either, but it’s kind of nice.   
“Thank you.” His eyes are shining.

Mark nods awkwardly. “Uh…okay.”   
It’s no big deal, seriously.  
Money is clearly not an issue and everybody who talks with Dustin for longer than five seconds knows that he’s a rabid Star Wars-fan. See? No big deal.   
“So you like it,” he verifies. “That’s good. Great. Certain people have attested me poor gift making qualities during the last few years, but…you’re surprisingly easy.”

Dustin laughs, presses another sloppy kiss at his forehead and he’s gone again. Mark is left breathless and bewildered. At the corner of his lips tugs a smile.

So Mark really loves almost everything about his job. He loves the creating, the coding binges, the shiny new high-tech stuff he can legitimately buy; he loves hosting Star Wars-movie-marathons for Dustin’s birthday, he loves talking about new features and he loves that he’s surrounded by people who are just as socially incompetent and nerdy as he is.

What he absolutely doesn’t love are the shareholder meetings.   
He doesn’t get why they have to go out of their way to make the investors happy and why they have to “include” them in the working process. The investors get their money’s worth, don’t they? Can’t they just stay away and not bother him?  
He can get away with skipping a few every now and then, but when he does it too often Chris starts to look frustrated and pinched. And when Chris starts to look frustrated, Dustin is worried and sad and does stupid things to cheer him up, because he adores Chris. And when Dustin is busy cheering Chris up, his programming skills start to suffer, which in turn is going to frustrate Mark. So everybody suffers until Mark eventually lowers himself into the measly realms of ‘business people’, the lowest and most boring form of the human specimen.

Today is one of those days.

“I don’t think I did anything to deserve this.”

“Hold still.”

“This is cruel and unusual punishment.”

“Mark, I’m not trying to rape you here.” Dustin sounds exasperated. “Hold still!”

“Your continued use of improper metaphors is quite astonishing. Ow, damn, that hurt!”

“My metaphors are never improper. And now quit being a baby.” Dustin presses a sloppy kiss against his temple and continues to massacre Mark’s curls. _He_ calls it untangling. Mark doesn’t really know why he tolerates it.   
Maybe it’s because he’s only wearing boxers right now, which is somewhat undermining his dignity. He folds his arms across his bare chest. He doesn’t pout, but it’s close. He doesn’t even know why Dustin is here and felt the burning urge to help him get ready. Mark is not a baby, he can get dressed himself, thank you very much.   
“And I won’t wear a suit,” he repeats just to make sure.

“I know.” Dustin nods. “It’s sad though, because you’re cruelly, willfully depriving me. You would look dashing in a suit, honey,” he coos and flutters his eyelashes.

Mark frowns at him. “I look like an idiot in a suit and you know it.”

Dustin also doesn’t wear anything but boxers and ridiculous socks with little Garfields on them.   
Garfield is like Dustin’s favorite cartoon character ever. Mark secretly thinks it’s because Garfield’s a lazy redhead and loves lasagna, but Dustin claims it’s because his snarky personality reminds him of someone. Whatever.   
“Ow.” He sends Dustin a nasty glare. “You know, it would be great if I had any hair left when this torture is over.”

“Can I borrow your black shirt? The one that says ‘ _Mastermind_ ’?”

Mark shrugs. “Sure.”

“Awesome.” Dustin beams. “I like wearing your shirts. It’s like there are little particles of you following me around.”

“You know, it sounds really gross when you put it this way.”

“Aww, don’t say that. I love all your Mark-particles.”

After Dustin has managed to entangle his hair, they spend another hour playing XBox in t-shirts and boxer shorts until their designated driver knocks downstairs. Then they stumble across each other in their haste to get dressed and end up looking kind of disheveled anyway. But Mark doesn’t mind so much.  
So far it’s not so bad.

Chris can organize the shit out of every event, so everything seems to be perfect when they arrive and there aren’t too many people yet, but enough that Mark can try to become invisible.   
“Doesn’t look too bad, right?” Dustin asks, sounding much too happy.

“Remember we have to suffer through this for the rest of the weekend,” Mark reminds him sourly. This is going to be long and awful. He only endures this torture to make Chris happy, which in turn will make Dustin happy. And because it might ( _might!_ ) be good for Facebook.

“But there’s free food!”

“Dustin, it’s not free food when we’re the ones who have to pay for it.”

Dustin pauses. “Yeah, well. Okay. But you can talk about the new features we planned, which are awesome and shiny and kickass. And you love talking about new features.”

“I love talking to people who understand what I’m talking about. These morons wouldn’t understand the difference between a bug and a feature if it bit them on the ass.” Mark tries to stay sour and grumpy, but it’s hard when Dustin is being so enthusiastic about everything.

He stays next to him and as always his voice is a steady stream of consciousness that’s calming and familiar. “Who’s the dude in the violet suit? Can I eat that? Check Marilyn out, man, she looks awesome. I would tap that… Why don’t we ever have any cool music playing? We could totally pay for Brandon Flowers. Are you sure we can’t eat that?”

It’s comfortable and Mark is pretty relaxed so far. At least until he looks up and sees Wardo.   
Wardo.  
Just like that.  
Standing in the middle of a Facebook shareholder meeting.

Mark feels a little dizzy all of a sudden. He blinks and blinks, because he’s almost certain he’s hallucinating. It sure feels surreal enough.

“Mark.” Dustin looks at him. His hand is warm and secure at his elbow. “You okay? Is it the cheese? I told Chris it looked bad, but he insisted the mold was where it should be and who am I to…?”  
Worried isn’t a good look on Dustin, Mark decides absently. Dustin should never be worried.   
He doesn’t answer, he’s still starring.

He hasn’t seen Wardo for months (Eduardo, he corrects, Eduardo. But whom is he fooling? It will never stop being ‘Wardo’ to him) and it feels like a rush to the head.   
He looks good.   
He looks different.   
He looks the same.

He’s all polite smiles and ridiculous puffy hair, expensive suits and huge brown doe eyes. He looks a little less gangly than he used to, broader in the shoulders and more…grown-up. More manly, Mark supposes, is the right expression.   
He doesn’t seem to have seen Mark. Yet.   
They’re only a few feet apart. It seems insignificant now, almost like nothing. But a few feet hadn’t been insignificant back then when the table between them looked like an impassable river.

“Mark? What is it?”

He shakes his head and tries to plot ways for a strategic exit, but Dustin has already turned around. Mark can feel him startle as he catches a glimpse of Wardo.   
“Oh,” Dustin says.

“I…I didn’t know he’d be here,” Mark admits. He clears his throat, once, twice, but it doesn’t help; his voice sounds still hoarse. He must be getting a cold or something. “It’s fine. It’s not a big deal. We’re just going to politely ignore each other. We talked all of this through with the lawyers. It’s not as if he has a restraining order or something.”

“Mark.”

“At least that’s what I think. In case he does have a restraining order, I guess, Chris would know what to do to avoid the scandal.”

“Mark,” Dustin says again and Mark really doesn’t get why he keeps repeating his name and he doesn’t get why Dustin keeps looking at him like that. “Mark. Are you going to be okay?”

Marks stares at him, blankly. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Dustin’s eyes are dark and his face looks…strange for a lack of a better word; it’s not a look Mark has seen on him before. “Your hands are really cold,” Dustin says quietly.

Mark looks down. He hadn’t even noticed his right hand is clenched tightly around Dustin’s wrist. His knuckles are white. It looks rather painful.

“Sorry.” He lets go rather abruptly.

“That’s not what I meant,” Dustin says quietly.

It’s that moment that Wardo looks up. His gaze wanders aimlessly across the room until he stops. His whole body seems to freeze as he sees Mark.   
He makes a sudden move as if he isn’t sure if he wants to fight or flight, run away or come closer, but he stops again, almost ashamed. Even from the distance Mark can see his throat bobbing up and down as he swallows.   
Sean also turns his head and when he sees Mark he has the audacity to wink and smile at him.

Dustin makes a noise deep in his throat that sounds as if a cute puppy tries to growl threatening. It doesn’t quite work. “And what the hell is he doing here?”

“You should go over and say hello,” Mark states abruptly. “I have things to do.”

Without waiting for a reply he turns around and walks away.   
He’s a busy person. He’s got things to see and people to do. Or, you know, whatever.  
It’s not as if he cares that Dustin and Chris most likely still have contact to Wardo and vice versa. Why would he? It’s a free country. They can talk to whomever they like.

The next hour is a buzz of…something. Mark isn’t quite sure. A reporter (how the hell did he get in here?) tries to ask him some questions and Mark completely blanks, but right on command Chris appears at his side. Chris always says all the right things like ‘ _our people are going to talk to your people_ ’ and so on and if that doesn’t work he’s scary enough to intimidate people with his pretty little smile.

Obviously he’s here to babysit Mark. Which is nice in a way, but it also sucks. He doesn’t need babysitting. What do they expect he’s going to do? He wouldn’t do anything that endangers Facebook, not ever.

After a while Dustin reappears.   
He and Chris exchange a few looks and there is a lot of nonverbal communication going on that Mark pretends doesn’t exist. Eventually Chris nods and leaves them alone.

“Hey there, Marky Mark,” Dustin says and Mark sighs.   
It’s one of Dustin’s particularly annoying habits that he keeps mutilating Mark’s name, which should be way too short for any kind of silly nicknames.   
Another one of his annoying habits is that he keeps saying ‘ _hi_ ’ or _‘hey you_ ’ even if they’ve been apart for no longer than a few minutes or not at all. Mark has spent countless hours explaining to him in great depth the pointlessness of repeated greetings, but to no avail. Usually he would roll his eyes at him, but not right now. Right now he’s busy rechecking the presentation about Facebook’s new features one of his employees is going to give later. Chris has given it to him, to proof-read, probably to distract him.

“So I just talked to Wardo,” Dustin starts somewhat randomly, and not random at all if you think about it.

Mark doesn’t grit his teeth. He doesn’t. “Good for you.”

“He said he’s here for business: Business like Facebook-business, which I think is cool, but you probably guessed that already. Anyway he’s going to stay for the weekend, he said, not much longer.”

Mark shrugs. “It’s a free country.”

“Yeah, you know…I think it would be cool…” Dustin pauses, obviously trying to paraphrase. “I got the feeling he wouldn’t particularly mind if you would go over and say hello.”

“Sure. That would be great,” Mark replies flatly. “Except oh wait, he sued me for 600 million dollars. You think that might’ve possibly put a damper on our friendship?”  
He doesn’t even know why he says it.   
It’s stupid and it’s childish. Neither are qualities he finds particularly attractive.   
He’s not angry at Eduardo. He isn’t. Not anymore.

“Mark.”

“I know what you’re doing. Stop it.”

“Mark…”

“Shut up!” he grits out and Dustin stops instantly. He looks wounded. It’s been a while since Mark has snapped at him and under different circumstances Mark would feel bad about it.

Maybe Mark doesn’t have the right to be angry. Maybe he’s supposed to feel guilty for the rest of his life.   
He’s just…he’s so sick of people assuming they know what has been going on between him and Eduardo, when they _don’t_. Nobody does. They weren’t there.   
And it wasn’t…it wasn’t just Mark being a heartless monster. Yes, he did behave like a jerk, but it wasn’t because…it wasn’t because he didn’t care.   
He never tried to hurt Wardo, but things happened and things got said and he lost control about it halfway and then there was no stopping it anymore. And he might’ve done stuff that he regrets, God yes he did, but Wardo also did stuff that was mean and petty and that was meant to hurt Mark. He froze the account, he refused to work with Sean, he refused to listen to anything Mark said and he…he didn’t come. He just wouldn’t come out to Palo Alto, no matter how often Mark asked him to. Begged him to.

Mark doesn’t care about other people and he doesn’t care about what they think of him. They don’t count. They’re not important. When they look at him…he almost doesn’t feel it.   
But it hurts when even Chris and Dustin assume it’s his fault, _all of it, it’s his fault, because he’s heartless and a robot_ …because they are supposed to be his friends, too. They’re supposed to know him. Because if they don’t even know him…if they don’t even know who is and what he’s capable of doing and what not…  
He doesn’t finish the thought.   
He just takes a deep breath. And another.

“You look at me and you wonder how I did it,” Mark says quietly and he doesn’t look up. “I know you do. You wonder how _anybody_ is able to do something like that to his best friend. And I know that you and Chris…you expect me to go down on my knees in front of him and beg for forgiveness. And because he’s Wardo he’s going to forgive me and then all is well and we will be the Fabulous Four again and it will be awesome and genius and it will be like Harvard all over again. But it doesn’t work like that. It doesn’t. So…stop it. Just stop.”

Dustin is quiet for a moment. This time Mark does grit his teeth. He fully expects him to point out what kind of an unfeeling asshole Mark is, and maybe he is. Maybe everybody is right about him when they say he’s the only living heart donor.

But Dustin doesn’t say anything like that.   
“I…I think you missed something here,” he says instead and points at the screen.

“Where?”

Dustin shoves him aside and squeezes himself on the chair as well. It’s way too small for both of them, but Mark doesn’t mind that much. Dustin starts typing and explaining simultaneously, his body pressed close against Mark’s side. Mark doesn’t really listen, but he watches his mouth and his fingers moving which is strangely soothing.

“That cool with you?” Dustin asks eventually.

“Cool.” Mark nods. He trusts Dustin’s programming abilities enough not to examine what he did.

Dustin smiles and saves his changes with a few clicks. “Cool.”   
When he’s done, he grasps Mark’s hand. Just like that. Mark blinks and looks down at their intertwined fingers.

“You’re holding my hand,” he points out. “Why are you holding my hand?”

“It’s fine,” Dustin says in a way that makes Mark feel as if has missed part of the conversation.

“What is?”

“I just…you should know…” Dustin presses his fingers and shrugs awkwardly. “If you want to talk to Wardo or if you don’t. Even if you don’t ever want to talk to him again.” He looks at him intently. “It’s fine. Okay? It’s _all_ fine.”

Something warm is slowly unfurling in his stomach. Maybe he’s really coming down with a bug, Mark thinks. Stomach flu or something. “Okay.” His voice sounds weird and he clears his throat, before he adds a tiny “Thanks”.

He doesn’t talk to Wardo that evening. He may or may not have watched him from afar, though.

Dustin invites himself over for the night, because he’s intrusive like that, and he sleeps curled around Mark like a little puppy.   
He doesn’t make him talk about…stuff, for which Mark is immensely grateful. They’re not even making out or trading hand jobs, so it seems rather redundant that he stays at all. But his breath is warm and comforting in Mark’s neck and he keeps one hand pressed gently on Mark’s chest. Above his heart.  
Why he keeps insisting (however implicitly) that Mark has a heart and that it might need protecting, Mark doesn’t know. It makes no sense at all.   
But then again…Dustin never does.

*

When Mark wakes up in the middle of the night he’s shaking.   
It’s one of those moments when there’s no space between sleep and alertness, no drifting, no waking up, just his heart hammering in his chest, eyes jerked wide open. He feels cold and his breath sounds labored and he doesn’t remember what he dreamed except it must’ve been cold, because he’s freezing. His stomach lurches and he’s out of his bed and on the way to the bathroom before his brain is even able to catch up with his legs.   
Something’s wrong. Something’s really, really wrong.

He kneels in front if the toilette, bare legs giving out under him, and he throws up. His intestines feel as if they’re trying to fight their way out of his body and he closes his eyes, tries to gulp for air. He’s seeing stars. Breathing is almost impossible, his throat is tight and his hand is shaking so hard, that he can’t even manage to flush.   
Someone does it for him.

He feels rather than sees somebody kneeling next to him and even with his eyes still closed he knows it is Dustin.

“Mark?” he whispers. “Shit. Are you all right?”

Mark shakes his head. He can’t answer; he can’t deal with anything right now. He’s not all right, but he doesn’t know what’s wrong either.

A warm hand comes to rest on his back and then Mark is retching again.

It feels never-ending. There aren’t even words to describe how embarrassing this is.   
He can’t breathe. His mouth tastes like acid and when he coughs it burns in his throat. Dustin murmurs soft, silly, redundant little things about how he’s here (Mark _knows_ that) and how everything is going to be all right (how the hell would he _know_ that?) and Mark can’t do anything except trying to catch breathe, shaking like a leaf and listening.   
He really wants to tell Dustin to leave him alone, but he can’t talk right now and he’s pretty sure Dustin wouldn’t listen anyway.

Twenty minutes (that feel like hours) later, he finds himself still sitting on the floor, but at least he leans against the bath tub and a glass of water appears out of nowhere in front of him.   
“Go away,” he croaks. He takes the water nevertheless.

Of course Dustin does the opposite of what he’s told and sits down next to him on the cold floor. Mark coughs and groans unhappily. “I might have some kind stomach bug…you don’t want to catch it,” he tries. His voice almost gives out in him halfway through the sentence and he coughs again. His mouth tastes terrible and he grimaces as he swallows some more water. It certainly feels like something flu-like. Cold and dizzy and nauseous. He hasn’t felt this bad in a while.

“I don’t think it’s a stomach thing,” Dustin replies. He puts an arm around Mark’s shoulders, incredibly gently as if Mark might break or might vomit again if he isn’t handled with care. And even though he is probably really sticky and gross right now Mark sighs, shifts a little bit closer and let his head rest on Dustin’s shoulder.

“I think it’s a heart-thing,” Dustin says very, very quietly and Mark almost wants to laugh, because seriously. Only Dustin could say something cheesy like that and sound so sincere.

“’s nothing wrong with my EKG.” He’s so exhausted he almost slurs.   
EKG. Because there might be spikes and curves and electric impulses running around, but there’s no heart.

He doesn’t really remember how it ends up back in bed, but he assumes it has something to do with Dustin, because he’s there the whole night. His voice doesn’t stop talking and his hands don’t stop touching him.   
And when Mark falls asleep again, he dreams. Not of people and not of black holes threatening to swallow him whole. He dreams in endless strings of code, html and php that curl around him like a blanket, softly, gently and reassuring.

 _It’s all fine._

Maybe it is.


	8. At absolute Zero, you would still move me

When he wakes up the second time, it’s light outside. He’s bundled up in blankets (the way his mom would bundle him up when he was being sick as a kid) and Dustin sits next to him, legs outstretched and playing idly with his laptop.

“Hey,” Dustin greets softly.

Mark blinks slowly, owlishly up at him. His brain reacts kind of sluggish. He’s pretty sure he should feel embarrassed, except it’s only Dustin seeing him like that so it’s almost okay.

“How are you feeling? You don’t look so green anymore, so I suppose that’s a good sign.”

Mark looks at him resentfully and doesn’t answer.   
He also doesn’t feel so cold anymore. In fact he feels quite warm which is kind of nice and probably a good sign. His stomach still feels a little queasy, but it’s better than it was last night. At least what fuzzy parts of last night he still remembers.   
“What time is it?” he asks.

“Past noon,” Dustin says, sounding way too relaxed.

“ _What?_ ” Mark groans. “What the hell is wrong with you? Why didn’t you wake me?” he grits out and starts to push the blankets away. “We’re going to be late.”

Dustin sighs and closes his laptop. “You don’t have to go.”

“Yes, I have to.” Mark sits up. “You spend the last three weeks convincing me how unacceptable it would be for me not to attend and now you’re telling me it’s not such a big deal?”

“Yeah, but…” Dustin hesitates. He looks as if he wants to say more, but changes course mid-sentence. “I talked to Chris earlier and he said it’s okay. You really don’t have to go if you’re not feeling well.”

“I feel _fine_.”

Dustin scrutinizes him with an unhappy frown.   
Without warning he raises both of his hands and puts one on his own forehead and the other on Mark’s, probably to compare temperatures. The gesture is so incredibly dorky that Mark doesn’t even protest. He just rolls his eyes at him.  
“Not running a fever.”

“You don’t feel very warm,” Dustin admits hesitantly.

“See?”

“But you feel all cold and clammy. That can’t be great either.” Dustin’s puppy face looks unhappy and torn and he slowly lowers his hands. “Are you sure you want to go back there?”

Mark folds his arms in front of his chest. “Is that a trick question? Of course I don’t want to go back and you know that.”

“But then…”

“I won’t chicken out,” he replies quietly. “I won’t.”   
He doesn’t say any more than that, but somehow Dustin seems to understand that he’s not only talking about the shareholder meeting, because he just nods silently and stops bugging him about staying at home. He insists staying in the bathroom though while Mark takes a shower and he helps him pick out a shirt (light blue, no print, thank you) and untangling his wet curls, which isn’t the same torture as it was yesterday. It’s almost nice.

When they arrive at the meeting, they aren’t even terribly late and they’ve only missed two (probably really boring) marketing guys presenting some statistics and numbers from the last quarter.

Wardo is there. He sits in the middle of the crowd, head bowed gracefully and he’s making notes as if he’s actually listening to this crap. Maybe he is. Wardo is conscientious enough that it’s actually possible.   
This time Mark refuses to feel surprised by his presence.

Mark keeps in the background the whole time like a creepy creeper and he watches Wardo. It feels awfully familiar and he realizes it used to be like this a lot back then in Harvard. Wardo being social and nice and talking, smiling, getting along with everybody and Mark would hang around at the periphery of things, watching, observing, frowning and forever trying to figure people out.

At one point Wardo talks to Chris who smiles and hugs him, but looks pretty serious after a while. Something is going on, but it’s not as if it’s Mark’s business anymore.

Dustin stays by his side like an angry, protective, little pit bull. He tries to look suave and busy, which he’s so not pulling off, but he keeps throwing Mark little looks, a little hesitant and worried as if he expects him to keel over any second.

“You’re hovering,” Mark snaps angrily.

“I’m what…I’m not!”

“Yes, you are. It’s annoying. Stop it.”

“Excuse me for occupying your precious space.” Dustin rolls his eyes at him. “And since my presence is clearly not appreciated here I’ll go over there now and do…do something really important and you’re not allowed to stop me.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.”

Before he goes, Dustin hesitates once more. “Mark…”

“This got nothing to do with you,” Mark snaps. “This is between me and him.”

Dustin shuts his mouth with an almost audible plop. His shoulders hunch and he nods silently.   
For a second Mark kind of wishes he hadn’t said it, because it might be true, but it also might not, since Dustin is the one who has been with him the whole time and who had to pick up the pieces of everything that happened. If it were anybody’s business except his own and Wardo’s it would be Dustin’s.   
Dustin is gone before he can add anything though. Mark buries his hands in his pockets and decides he needs some fresh air. He starts to feel sweaty and shaky again, which isn’t a particularly good feeling.

He’s almost out on the terrace, when he bumps into someone taller than him. This isn’t exactly difficult considering Mark isn’t that tall, but this is someone tall with a ridiculous amount of fluffy dark hair and huge brown eyes and a well-fitting suit. A Prada one. His heart skips a beat that feels as if he just tripped and missed a step.

An arm shoots out and grips his elbow to steady him when he stumbles backwards.

“Oh sorry,” a polite and all too well-known voice says. “I didn’t see…Mark.”

“Eduardo,” he says and tries to sound as if he means it. He might not be allowed to say ‘Wardo’ anymore, but he’s never going to say ‘Mr. Saverin’.

Wardo lets go of his arm as if he has been burnt. “…hi.”

Mark nods. He looks everywhere except at Wardo’s face. “Hi.”

“I…I should go back inside.”

Mark nods wordlessly. He feels a little queasy and strangely distant as if there’s an empty space separating him from the rest of the world, an abyss without air and sound and color.   
Wardo moves, but then he hesitates.   
For seconds nothing happens.

When Wardo talks again, his voice is carefully void of any emotion. “Are you all right?”

“I’m good.” He’s pretty sure that he’s supposed to say _‘How are you?’_ now, but he doesn’t. He can’t.   
His throat feels kind of tight.

Wardo hesitates again. It’s as if he’s waiting for something. And maybe he is, Mark thinks tired. Wardo was always, always waiting for something, was waiting for Mark to look up and stop coding. Maybe he’s still waiting for Mark to become a better person, a different person. Maybe he’s still waiting for an apology.

“Mark.” A tight grip around his biceps has him snapping back to reality. Wardo looks torn, his eyebrows tightly knit together. “You’re shaking.”

Mark blinks at him, dazed and a little confused. Does he? “I’m okay.”

Wardo looks at him and shakes his head. “Sit down and wait here,” he orders tersely. “I’ll go and get somebody.”

“What? _Why?_ ”

“Because I’m not an asshole, Mark!” Wardo snaps at him.

Mark just looks at him. “As opposed to me?” he replies calmly.

Wardo shakes his head in a way that might as well be meant as a nod. “You look like you’re about to faint,” he says, sounding calmer somehow, almost resigned. “I suppose you haven’t been eating. You never do.”   
He doesn’t sound cold, but only because Wardo isn’t able to sound cold even if he tries. He sounds frustrated instead. Hurt. Angry. Worried. Spiteful.

 _‘I’m not coming back for thirty percent. I’m coming back for **everything**.’_

“Can you get Dustin?” Mark hears himself ask. He doesn’t even know why he says it and he doesn’t add ‘please’, because he doesn’t feel like begging. Not anymore. He also doesn’t know how he ends up sitting on the stairs.   
He listens to Wardo’s steps walking away.   
Maybe he’s never coming back, he thinks and he ends up putting his head between his knees, because apparently that’s what people are supposed to do when they feel dizzy and as if the ground is about to fall out beneath them. It doesn’t help. Not really.

Dustin is the first one to arrive. It sounds as if he’s running or at least walking pretty fast. Wardo should’ve told him it’s not like an emergency or anything.   
“Shit! What happened? Not cool, Wardo. Not cool!” Mark hears him exclaim breathlessly. “What did you do to him? You’re not allowed to kill each other, you know that! Mark? Mark!”

“I didn’t do anything,” Wardo says, sounding insulted and Mark almost laughs, because everything feels too well-known all of a sudden.

Dustin sits down next to Mark on the steps and one of his hands end up on Mark’s shoulder, tentatively touching him and making it appear like a question.

“I’m good.” Mark’s teeth clack together around the last word as if they are chattering. He doesn’t know why he’s freezing. It seems stupid considering it’s fairly warm outside.   
Something warm and soft gets thrown over his shoulders, something that smells like Red Bull and keyboards and _Dustin_ in a way that’s startling familiar and comforting. It’s Dustin’s hoodie that says ‘ _Jesus saves. Buddha does incremental back-ups_ ’, because Dustin doesn’t even own one piece of clothing without some kind of ridiculous statement on it.

“You doing okay there, Markaroni?” Dustin asks which has Mark raising his head eventually. Nodding seems like too much of an effort, so he doesn’t. “Splendid.”

Dustin examines him. “You’re not looking so hot.”

“Thanks. You managed to insult anybody else yet?”

Dustin’s hand rubs comforting circles on Mark’s back. “Don’t worry, I’m not you. Everybody loves me.”

“Sure they do.”

Voiceless Dustin mouths: “ _Home_?” and Mark shakes his head barely noticeable. He’s not going to run again.

“Haven’t you been feeding him?” Wardo asks. “You know he doesn’t do it himself.”

“We manage.”

“It sure doesn’t look like it.”

“Wardo, we’re doing _fine_.” Mark isn’t exactly fine-tuned to undertones, but he thinks Dustin might’ve sound the tiniest bit defensive.

Wardo seems to deflate a little at that. His hands are hanging limply down his sides and he looks less scornful now and a lot more helpless. Vulnerable.   
“That’s good,” he says softly. “That’s really…good.”

He sounds unguarded all of a sudden just like he used to sound back then in Harvard. Defenseless and exposed as if Mark would only ever have to ask and he would tell him everything, give him everything.   
As if he could just peel Wardo’s skin away and lay his inner most self bare.   
He hasn’t sound like that in a long time and it makes part of Mark feel homesick and another part of him feel just sick. It used to be easy, owning somebody, somebody’s heart, soul and body so utterly and completely, mostly because back then he didn’t even knew he did. But now it seems almost impossible to deal with it.

“Sit down,” Mark says and it barely avoids making it an order, because it wasn’t meant to be one, just an offer. Wardo pulls up one of the chairs and does as he’s told. He looks tense, just the way Mark feels.   
Now that he looks at him closely for the first time he also realizes that Wardo looks tired and drawn. There are pinched lines around his eyes and he’s pale as if he hasn’t had enough sleep during the last few days. Maybe it’s just jetlag. Mark isn’t sure. He doesn’t even know where Wardo lives at the moment.

“Wardo, you okay?” Dustin chooses this exact moment to ask. He sounds gentler now and Mark can hear the underlying concern in his voice.

This is the moment when Wardo says: “Oh shit,” and exhales angrily, which is an answer in itself, except it’s kind of unexpected, because Wardo rarely swears. “Yes,” he says and then: “No.”

Irritated Mark looks up and squints.   
At first he doesn’t see much, but when he follows Wardo’s gaze he catches glimpses of a figure approaching. It’s the goddamn reporter who has been there yesterday.

“I need to go,” Wardo says.

“What? Why?” Dustin looks confused.

Wardo shakes his head, lips pressed tightly together. But Mark isn’t stupid and he has seen his fair share of crazy stalker reporter, so he can take a guess what’s going on.

“We could call for Chris and let him deal with him,” he suggests.   
Chris is awesome with reporters. He has them wrapped around his little finger with his understated charm and calm confidence and he’s never really saying more than the stating the obvious, but he does it so well, that people feel he’s letting them in on some kind of a big secret. And if they’re really, _really_ annoying – well, Chris can say what he wants, he totally _is_ the mafia.   
It’s a great idea, but nobody’s listening to him.

“Are you here by car?” Dustin asks. He looks serious all of a sudden and when Wardo nods, he adds: “Could you take us with you?”

“I…I guess,” Wardo replies at the same moment Mark hisses: “ _What_?”

“We’re going home,” Dustin says and starts dragging Mark up. “Now.”

For a second Wardo looks torn as if he wants to run, maybe to get away from the reporter and maybe to get away from Mark, who knows, but he doesn’t. _Of course he doesn’t_ , Mark thinks, feeling oddly surreal. Wardo is nothing but a gentleman. And the only person who has ever made him lose his gentleness was Mark.

Eventually Wardo nods. “Okay, whatever. Just go!”   
It’s too late. Mark can actually see him freeze for a second.

“Eduardo, fancy seeing you here.”   
The reporter is really close now and even his voice sounds smarmy. Mark hates him on sight. And it’s totally not because he calls Wardo by his first name as if they’re best friends.

“No comment,” Wardo says.

“Just some questions.” He steps closer and keeps on smiling in a way that reminds Mark of shark week and all the happy, smirking sharks, fletching their teeth when they caught sight of their prey.   
He’s talking so fast that his sentences continue to flow into each other. “You know our readers are very interested in the people who _own_ our money while everybody else is losing theirs. Would you like to discuss the situation of your father’s corporation with me? Hey, hey - now this is a surprise. Is that actually Mark Zuckerberg you’re talking to?”

Dustin throws the reporter a look that could’ve melted a hard drive and simultaneously jerks the hood of his sweatshirt over Mark’s curls as if he’s trying to cover him up. Mark is pretty sure it’s too late for that.

“No comment,” Wardo hisses and grabs Mark’s other arm.   
Jesus. He must look pretty awful if both feel the need to support him. Mark would roll his eyes; except he thinks he’s probably going to faint if he tries.

“Our readers have the right to be informed!”

“Go to hell,” Dustin snarls and jerks Mark forward. Something flashes behind them. Obviously the retard paparazzo is trying to get a photo of them. Wardo is walking faster and faster.

“Didn’t we hire some kind of security?” Mark murmurs. It’s getting hot beneath the thick fabric of Dustin’s hoodie.

“Yeah, but they’re busy inside, guarding your precious little playthings and making sure nobody steals software from us,” Dustin replies. “Keep your head down.”

“This garden is like a goddamn jungle. How do we get to the parking lot?” Wardo asks, sounding stressed and almost frantic.

“I like the jungle!” Dustin protests.

“Of _course_ you do.”

And Mark feels like laughing so much it’s almost painfully tearing at his insides.

“Hey Mark! Mark. Mr. Zuckerberg. Is it true, that you were sued for sexual harassment of a minor last year?”

“I’ll show you harassment,” Dustin mutters angrily. “How do they always make this shit up?!”

“Is this why you are having a nervous breakdown? Hey Mark, why don’t we talk for a second? I heard things about the treatment of Facebook employees I’d like to discuss with you. There are rumors about hazing and minors being forced to participate in illegal drinking contests.”

Mark walks faster, head bowed down. He almost stumbles twice on the way to the parking lot, but someone, either Wardo or Dustin catches him and keeps him upright. He doesn’t stop and he doesn’t turn around.

They almost make it to the car in one piece.   
Almost.

They are probably five feet apart from Wardo’s car (a sleek, black Mercedes) when the reporter says: “Hey, Eduardo, is it true your father disowned you?”

Mark can feel Wardo flinch and he frowns, because that can’t possibly be true.

“This must feel pretty familiar to you, doesn’t it? And what about the rumors that you and Mark have been more than friends, before he screwed you out of his company? Did he, you know, screw you in every sense of the word?”

Dustin bristles like an angry cat and Mark flinches violently. Wardo lets go of him so abruptly that Mark almost stumbles.

“Wardo, don’t…” Dustin starts, but it’s too late already.

With five steps Wardo has reached the reporter and has raised his hand, and faster than Mark is able to think ‘ _oh shit, this is going to hurt…!_ ’ Wardo punches him squarely in the face.

*

“Ouch.” Wardo flinches.

“Yeah, you shouldn’t have hit him through the camera,” Dustin says. His tongue is jammed between his teeth while he’s busy concentrating on pulling out tiny splinters out of the back of Wardo’s hand.  
Obviously cameras aren’t made to be used as punching bags.

It’s a surreal picture that Mark never thought he would live to see - Wardo sitting on his couch, in his house, and Dustin operating tiny pieces of glass out of his flesh.

“Maybe.” Wardo’s voice sounds rough and Dustin looks up and squints at him.

Eventually he pats his knee comfortingly. “Remember when I tried to build a rocket using the coffee maker and parts of the ventilation?” he murmurs.

“God yes. You were so high,” Wardo replies drily. “And you almost blew up the whole building.”

“Dude. This is so _not_ what this is about! In the end you pulled like a ton of splinters out of me, a few, I should mention, out of very sensitive areas of my body. So this means we’re, like, splinter-brothers now. The bonds that can’t be broken.”

At this Wardo laughs and at least he looks a little less exhausted and haggard.

Mark sits huddled in front of his laptop without actually typing, because this is totally his secret comfort zone. Real life is full with little rules and regulations and with _people_ , and he never quite knows what to say and do and how to look normal, but he always knows what to do in front of a computer screen.   
Right now he’s on the phone though.

“Mark, Mark,” Chris’ voice groans. “All hell is loose! The shareholders are freaking out. People talk about a brawl. There’s an ambulance standing out there. How did that happen? _What_ happened? Are you okay? Are Dustin and Wardo okay? Do I need to call Marilyn?”

“Yeah,” Mark tells his cell which is the answer to the last three questions. It seems sufficient enough. As for what happened? He has no idea. But he’s pretty sure that Wardo should probably talk to a lawyer about punching somebody in the face.

“Where _are_ you, Mark? Is Dustin with you? And where is Wardo? How fast did you drive? Do I need to worry about any of you losing his license?”

“Yes. No.”The last part is a wonder considering that it was Dustin who drove Wardo’s car. Dustin drives like a maniac even at the best of times.

“What?” Chris sighs. “Mark, you’re not making any sense. Please let me talk to Dustin.”

Obediently Mark puts him on speaker phone and holds the cell in Dustin’s direction.   
“It’s Chris,” he says. “He doesn’t want to talk to me.”

“Christopher~!” Dustin chirps. “Sorry, can’t talk right now, I’m busing saving people’s lives, tracheotomy with a pencil and a straw, rockin’ and rollin’, you know how it is.”

“Is somebody hurt?” Chris sounds calm as if he’s prepared to call 911 any second now. “Is somebody bleeding or asphyxiating? If yes, let me handle it. Remember you’re _not_ Dr. House, Dustin.”

Dustin pouts, because he totally thinks he _is_ Dr. House and Mark actually caught him practicing a very convincing limp in front of a mirror once. But Chris probably doesn’t want to know this.

It’s Wardo who answers. “Everybody’s fine, Chris. We’re at Mark’s house.” He clears his throat. “I’m really sorry about what happened. It was my fault and I’m going to handle it. No need to bother Marilyn. Nobody’s going to lose his license about this. Just…just the press is probably going to be trouble.”

“Wardo.” If Chris is surprised by his presence he doesn’t show it. “Thank you for the information. I really missed talking to a grown-up.”   
He might be joking, but Mark gets the feeling Chris is quite serious.

“It wasn’t Wardo’s fault!” Dustin objects heatedly. “The guy was harassing us! He was really rude to Wardo. And he was mean to Mark! If Wardo wouldn’t have hit him, I would!”

Mark feels an amount of surprised warmth surging through him. Dustin throws him a look that’s probably meant to be reassuring and protective, but looks mostly looks dorky and somewhat cute.

“Please don’t hit anybody,” Mark tells him. “Chris wouldn’t like that.”   
Dustin is skinny and pale and nerdish and probably not able to hit anybody, but still.

“I wouldn’t!” Chris confirms.

“Not even people who are mean to you?” Dustin asks.

“If you’re going to punch everybody who hates me, you’re never going to be finished.”

“Mark, don’t say that.” Dustin looks crestfallen. With everybody else Mark would assume it was just meant to be reassuring, but Dustin actually _believes_ that. He thinks people take him for a misunderstood genius or something. “Nobody hates you!”

 _Yes they do_ , Mark thinks, _they always do._   
He’s weird. He’s different. He’s impolite. He screwed his best friend out of his company.   
He’s so not going to win any ‘People’s Choice Awards’ anytime soon. Maybe hate is too strong a word though, but they dislike him.   
At least one person in this room right now definitively does. He doesn’t dare looking at Wardo.

“Thanks, Dustin.” Wardo doesn’t look at him either. Carefully he moves his fingers, which seem to function. His right hand is wrapped up in too much gauze and band-aids with little dinosaurs. Mark would mock Dustin for them, except he doesn’t even own band-aids, so he probably shouldn’t. “I should go now.”

“Hey look,” Chris’ voice says. Mark has almost forgotten he’s still on the phone. “I texted Marilyn. I know, you said not to bother her, but your own lawyers are still in New York. She’s coming over to your hotel tomorrow morning, okay? Whatever happens just let her handle it. I’ll try to deal with the press.”

Sometimes Mark thinks that if Chris weren’t into guys, he would totally marry Marilyn. She’s probably the only person in his life who he deems capable enough to ‘handle things’.

“Okay. I will. Thank you,” Wardo says softly.

“Take care.”

There’s a moment of awkward silence after Chris hangs up.   
Dustin looks back and forth between them as if he expects someone to say something. When it becomes abundantly clear that neither Mark nor Wardo are going to, he clears his throat.   
“You don’t have to leave, Wardo. Would you like to stay for dinner?” he asks casually.

“He says ‘dinner’, but he means pizza,” Mark adds without looking up.

“It’s not my fault you don’t even own one piece of cookware!” Dustin exclaims.

“I don’t cook! So what would I need cookware for?”

“ _I_ cook!”

“Then ask Chris to go high quality, stainless steel cookware-shopping with you the next time he takes you out.”

Dustin pokes out his tongue at him which is so mature. Mark flips him the bird which is also really mature, but hey, nobody said you had to grow up after college. The familiarity of this particular argument feels almost soothing.

“Thank you. Pizza sounds great, but I really should go now.” Wardo’s looking mostly at Dustin as he speaks. That’s fine. It’s absolutely fine. Nobody would expect him to do otherwise after everything Mark did to him, right? Right.

And Mark absolutely isn’t bitter about it.

“Okay.” Dustin nods and gets up. He stands a little awkwardly in front of Wardo and for a second he looks at Mark as if he’s asking for permission. Mark pretends he’s focused on the screen and doesn’t see it. “Just…you know…take care of yourself, man.”

Wardo nods.

Impulsively Dustin leans forward and pulls him into an embrace. “Call me immediately if your hand doesn’t get better, okay? It might need surgical removal. But I promise you will be able to play the piano again.”

“You’re crazy,” Wardo says fondly and pats his back.

“You’re not Dr. House, Dustin,” Mark says.   
For a second he feels a strange kind of phantom pain in his chest as he watches Wardo leave. The door closes behind him with an audible ‘click’. It takes forever until Mark hears him starting the car.   
That was that, he thinks.   
Maybe he’s doomed to say goodbye to Wardo for the rest of his life, never being able to change things, never being able to turn back time. Never being able to ask for forgiveness, because he’s not sorry.

 _‘Are the rumors true that you and Mark have been more than friends, before he screwed you out of his company? Did he, you know, screw you in every sense of the word?’_

He closes his eyes.

“Mark,” Dustin says and when Mark opens his eyes he realizes surprised that Dustin is kneeling in front of his chair.

“Dustin.”

“Mark. I…I mean…are you …what…” Dustin stops mid-sentence and takes a deep breath. “Do you really want me to order pizza now?” he blurts out.

“No.” Mark shakes his head slowly. “No, I really don’t.”

“Good. Okay. Yeah. Me neither.” Dustin nods feebly.

“This day sucked,” Mark says shakily.

“It sucked,” Dustin confirms.   
He frames Mark’s face with both hands in a way that’s tender and intense at the same time, before he leans forward and kisses him.   
It’s like a question.

Mark exhales and closes his eyes, before he opens his lips.  
It feels as if they’re falling into each other. There are teeth involved and tongue and Dustin’s lips are so soft and sweet and pliant. Sometimes Mark wants to crawl inside Dustin’s skin and hid there from the rest of the world.

Dustin does this little thing again, where he nip-sucks at Mark’s lower lip and Mark’s almost moans.   
Gripping the fabric of Dustin’s t-shirt almost violently Mark pulls him closer. He tries to get up, falters and tries again. When he succeeds he pulls Dustin up with him without disconnecting their lips for even a moment. Suppressed adrenalin flows through his veins and his heart hammers wildly in his chest.

“The reporter was an ass,” Dustin whispers and he’s peppering Mark’s face with little kisses. “Nobody hates you.”

Mark has heard about people having life-affirming sex after a particularly rough day, but this is somewhat ridiculous. It feels incredible nevertheless.

They stumble towards the couch, tearing at their clothes. Dustin’s hoodie ends up on the floor, next to their t-shirts, who get tangled together on their way to the ground. Dustin’s fingers shake when he fumbles with the zipper of Mark’s jeans and he has his face buried at Mark’s neck.

“I shouldn’t…I’m sorry”, he stammers breathlessly.

“You’re weird.” Mark gasps for air as Dustin’s tongue hit a sensitive spot. “Don’t be sorry.”

“You sure you want…?”

“I want.” Mark presses his lips against Dustin’s and tears at his jeans. “I want.”

“Are you…?”

“I am.”

He doesn’t know if he’s really okay. He still feels dizzy and lightheaded and disconnected from reality, but right now he doesn’t care. Dustin’s fingers are shaky and gentle when they run across his ribs, his back, his hips, but his lips are hungry and almost desperate. And yes, Mark wants, wants, wants.   
He buries his fingers in Dustin’s hair.

“Stop,” Dustin whispers. “Stop thinking about…”

“I’m not.” It’s the truth. He leaves a trail of wet kisses on Dustin’s chest. “I’m really not.”

 

*

Marilyn calls Chris’ office the next day and asks for their statement about what happened with the reporter.

When they arrive Chris is eyeballing the bruises at Mark’s throat (Dustin just can’t restrain himself) and the claw marks at Dustin’s neck (admittedly Mark can’t restrain himself either), but thankfully he doesn’t comment on either of them.

“They’re here,” he says instead and hands over the phone to Dustin.

“Marilyn! It’s a pleasure to hear your voice. … You don’t mean that. I know you love me. … Uhm, about that …well…yeah…kind of… Things got said, things happened. Yeah, that happened, too. … Wait. Is Wardo in trouble? Is he going to get sued?” Dustin asks worriedly. “He didn’t do anything wrong! Well, except hitting him, but the dude absolutely provoked it!”

Mark plays with Chris’ paper weight that looks like a piece of modern art and listens with one ear.

“You know, it wasn’t _exactly_ self-defense, but it was close! … Of course I was scared for my life! I was scared for all our lives! And for America! … No, I’m not making this up. … He broke his nose? Seriously? I’m impressed! … What? No, no, I meant, I’m shocked. I’m outraged, really.” Dustin high-fives Mark which in turn has Chris rolling his eyes at them. “Yes. Yes! Of course we are willing to testify against that asshole.”

Dustin opens his mouth to add something, but then he pauses and listens. “Oh,” he says eventually, sounding serious all of a sudden. “Really. … I understand. Yes. I… listen, do you…do you want to talk to Mark?”

Mark raises his head, surprised.

Dustin presses the receiver against his shoulder and whispers wide-eyed: “The reporter has filed a complaint against Wardo due to ‘assault’. He’s pressing charges!”

Mark frowns and gestures to Dustin to hand over the phone.   
“This is Mark,” he says. “What the hell is going on?”

Marilyn explains the situation short and to the point.   
“Criminal assault is a serious charge, Mark,” she finishes. “This might cause a lot of trouble. I recommend trying to settle and not let it go to court.”

“Can’t we just…pay him?” His mouth feels dry.

“I’d recommend it, but Eduardo says that’s not an option.”

Try to settle.   
This means depositions.   
They’re going to sit on a table with lawyers everywhere and the bastard reporter is going to make the whole thing about Facebook, about Mark and Wardo and all the things that happened between.  
Depositions.  
Mark doesn’t think he can do that again. He doesn’t think Wardo can do that again.   
Maybe there and then he panics a little.

“He tried to assault me first,” he says without thinking. “The reporter.”

Chris and Dustin are looking at him, but neither makes a sound.

Marilyn is quiet for a second. “Can you tell me exactly what happened?” she asks gently.

Mark swallows and inhales. “Yes. Sure. This guy showed up uninvited during a shareholder meeting which was held on my private property. He was trespassing. When he caught sight of us – Dustin, Wardo and me – he started to harass us. He was being rude and pushy and very aggressive. He said some things about people with financial assets who needed to be terminated.”

“What did he say exactly?”

 _‘Our readers are very interested in the people who own our money while everybody else is losing theirs.’  
‘I heard things about the treatment of Facebook employees I’d like to discuss with you. There are rumors about hazing and minors being forced to participate in illegal drinking contests.’_

“That people like us deserved to die.”   
Chris goes pale. Appalled he looks to Dustin. Dustin quickly shakes his head and gestures for him to calm down.

On the other end of the line Marilyn scribbles something. “Please go on.”

“We tried to leave, but he grabbed my arm,” Mark continues.

“Did you feel threatened?”

“Yes.”

Marilyn pauses as if she’s trying to word the next sentence extremely careful. “Mark, did you feel you were in acute personal danger?”

“I expected to get hurt.” It’s not even a lie.

“What happened then?”

“I freaked out. I think Wardo must’ve freaked out, too. It happened really fast. I don’t think he was trying to hurt the guy. He was just trying to get him away from me.”

“Are you prepared to swear an oath that _this_ is what happened?”

“Yes.”

Marilyn scribbles some more. Mark doesn’t dare to breathe.   
After a while the scribbling stops. “This is what happens: I’ll call his lawyer and tell him we’re going to countersue him for criminal assault and trespassing if he doesn’t back down. If he doesn’t we’re going to sue him so hard and so long that he won’t even know what hit him. And we’re going to make sure he’s never going to work as a reporter anywhere again, except maybe playing the agony aunt for some jerkwater local rag. That okay with you?”

“That would be great.” Mark exhales.

She lowers her voice. “Mark, are you all right?” she asks and sounds actually concerned.

“I’m good.”

“He didn’t hurt you, did he?”

“No.”

“Mark, if there’s any kind of trouble you want me to handle for you, just give me a call, all right? That’s what I’m here for.”

“I know. Thank you,” he adds, because Marilyn is one of the few persons (maybe second to his mother), who makes him want to be polite. She’s just such a genuinely sweet and earnest person. When he hangs up, Dustin quietly takes the phone from his fingers.

“Mark.” Chris sounds distressed. “You didn’t say…why didn’t you…?”

Mark shakes his head. “Don’t worry. I lied.”

“What?”

“I _lied_. I made it up. Nothing happened.” He buries his hands in his pockets and throws a gaze to Dustin. “You coming? I need you to check over some work from the interns.”

“Mark…” Chris tries again. Dustin shakes his head.   
Once more there’s some silent communication going on. Obviously they don’t even need words anymore to talk about Mark being weird.

“I’m at my office,” Mark says brusquely and walks out of Chris’ office without waiting for a reply.

Chris’ office is in one the quieter parts of the Facebook-building and there are only a few people rushing silently through the corridors. They’re obviously not programmers, so they’re probably Chris’ little minions.

Dustin catches him halfway down the floor. He doesn’t bother with platitudes.   
“You didn’t lie,” is what he says.

“I did.” Mark shrugs. “I didn’t feel threatened.”

“Because you’re an idiot.”

“Wardo didn’t want to protect me.”

“Yes, he did.” Dustin reaches out and jerks at his t-shirt and suddenly Mark finds himself pressed against the wall. “I did, too,” he breathes.

It should’ve sound incredibly cheesy, but he sounds so sincere that Mark doesn’t have it in him to laugh at Dustin.   
“I felt pretty much protected in your invisibility cloak, Harry Potter,” he says instead.

Dustin laughs and lowers his hands. He lets his forehead rest on Mark’s shoulder.   
“It was nice what you did,” he says. His voice sounds muffled. “We just tell the police this is what happened and there’ll be no depositions. Wardo is going to be fine. I’m sure.”

“Yeah.”

Dustin sighs and raises his head. Gently he pulls at one of Mark’s curls.  
“What now?”

“What now,” Mark repeats.

Dustin’s face becomes all soft. “Want to have a coding spree for the new feature? I’ll get us Red Bull and Twizzlers and we see who the first to finish his part is.”

“Sounds good.” Actually that sounds all kinds of awesome. Mark nods and he even allows that Dustin entwines their fingers when they start walking again. “What do I get?” he asks. “When I win, I mean.”

“Why do you assume _you_ win?”

“I’m so much better than you, Moskovitz.”

“ _Ooooh!_ ” Dustin grins. “Are you now? It’s on, Zuckerberg! I’m so going to kick your ass into next week.”

Dustin beams at him and for a second breathing is easy again. Mark lets himself get dragged behind Dustin who bounces enthusiastically down the hall and shouts to the interns that “ _it’s on!_ ”.


	9. Loopback

What Mark hasn’t really thought through is the fact that a.) he and Dustin would have to go to the police to make a statement and b.) that he kind of forced Dustin to commit perjury when he lied about what happened.   
When he realizes it he genuinely feels bad about it, but Dustin merely shrugs when he points it out.

“I made you a criminal,” Mark insists.

“We are enemies of the state anyway,” Dustin replies which, sadly, is true. Authorities have never been exactly fond of Facebook and they’re definitely not fond of Mark either.   
Dustin starts humming _‘cause you’re a criminal as long as you’re mine’_ , so Mark assumes he’s really okay with everything. He just worries a little bit about Dustin’s taste in music.

What Mark _has_ anticipated though is the statistic likelihood of running into Wardo again during the next few days.   
It’s only a matter of time, really.   
After all, no matter how great Marilyn is, even she needs some time to work things out. Which means Wardo is probably going to stay here for more than a few days.

He hasn’t expected to run into Wardo in a moment like this though.

It happens when they leave the police station.   
Everything has gone well; Marilyn had been there and made sure Mark and Dustin didn’t say anything that would land them in prison and Mark had basically told the same story as he did before.   
Reporter was trespassing, reporter started to harass them, Mark felt threatened, Eduardo freaked out, shit happened, clear case of self-defense, what can you say.   
Dustin has nodded at appropriate places and looked sufficiently serious for the occasion. They signed a paper and off they went.   
Not a big deal.

Of course Dustin turns everything into a big deal. Outside he jumps at Mark, grinning like a maniac and presses a quick kiss to his mouth.   
“Dude,” he exclaims, arms still around Mark’s neck. “That was awesome. How much did we rock that?”

The correct answer would be they didn’t rock anything, they just committed perjury, but Mark doesn’t get around explaining this fact to Dustin. A choked sound makes him turn around.   
It’s Wardo.  
Of course it’s Wardo.

It’s getting old pretty fast to out himself like that, Mark thinks somewhat sourly.

Wardo stands on the steps to the police station. He has stopped mid-step and stares at them open-mouthed with a look of utter confusion. His gaze wanders back and forth between Mark and Dustin’s hands around his neck which might look kind of compromising.   
“I…I thought you were joking,” he blurts out.

“Wardo,” Dustin exclaims happily and cocks his head. “Joking about what?”

Wardo waves his hand vaguely, his eyes still impossible wide. “The relationship status-thing on Facebook.”

Somehow Mark has always known this would come back to bite him in the ass.

Dustin turns to Mark, frowning. “Didn’t you tell him?”

Mark shrugs awkwardly. “Never came up.”

“Tell me what?” Wardo squeaks.

“We should’ve sent out greeting cards,” Mark grumbles. “And you _need_ to stop jumping me in public, Dustin. People get weird ideas like we’re together or something, and they think it’s their business which it’s _not_.”

“Oh.” Dustin lets go of him and steps back a little. He looks a little bit hurt and as though he expects Mark to say something, but seriously? Mark sucks at explaining things. Why does it always have to be him?

Dustin looks to Wardo and back to Mark.   
“Uhm yeah. This is awkward.” He scratches the back of his head. “Hey…I just realized I absolutely have to call Chris. I promised I’d tell him how it went and that we didn’t end up in prison and…stuff. I’ll…just go over there. And call. Yes.”

Great.   
“Uhm yeah,” Mark says and buries his hands in his pockets. “Hi, I guess.”

He’s still not used to seeing Wardo. Not so casually.   
It feels surreal after all the things that happened between them. After all the months they haven’t talked.

“Hi.” He clears his throat. “I just came by to say thank you. Marilyn told me what you said. You shouldn’t have done that. But…thanks.” He throws a gaze at Dustin, uncomfortably.

“Yeah. Whatever.”

They stand opposite each other, Mark a few steps above Wardo. That means for the first time in a pretty long while he’s able to look down on Wardo.   
His hair looks ridiculously shiny and pretty from above, he thinks, which might be the most absurd thought ever.

“So, you and Dustin…,” Wardo pauses. “Are you…since when…I mean … _how the hell did that happen?_ ”

Mark raises an eyebrow, amused.

“Sorry,” Wardo apologizes. “I didn’t mean it like that.” He runs a hand through his hair. “This is a little bit surprising.”

“I guess.”   
For the first time since Wardo stumbled back into his life Mark feels he’s not the only one helplessly floundering. On the contrary for the first time he feels that he’s the one more in control and it’s a surprisingly nice feeling.

“It’s probably none of my business,” Wardo states.

No, it isn’t. It really, really isn’t his business anymore.   
Mark glances over at Dustin who is standing a few feet apart. Right in this moment he looks up from his cell and waves a little. It looks oddly shy as if he isn’t sure he is allowed to do this.

“It happened in Palo Alto,” Mark says. “We were stoned.”

Wardo bursts out laughing. Mark raises his other eyebrow at him.   
“Of course.” Wardo sounds almost hysterical. “Of course you were stoned.” Then his gaze becomes wistful and his smile turns a little bit sad. “Palo Alto,” he says. “I see.”

It always feels kind of schizophrenic to associate so many awesome and happy things with Palo Alto and so many sad and angry things at the same time. Palo Alto is always going to be the place where everything happened. Everything good and everything bad.

“Is it…” Wardo gestures some more, obviously fishing for words. “Is it serious?”

“Why do people keep asking if it’s ‘ _serious_ ’? It’s not a disease. It’s not cancer. Nobody’s going to die. It’s just me and Dustin.”

“So it’s not…?”

“No. No. Of course not.” Mark shrugs. This time he doesn’t look at Dustin.

“You know, you _were_ kind of domestic, when I was there.”

“No, we weren’t.”

“You were talking about _cookware_!”

“We’re just fooling around. It’s just…sex. And well, the usual stuff we always do. We play XBox. We have coding sprees. We order pizza. Dustin scatters his surprisingly large collection of rubber ducks in my house. Why anybody would bother collecting rubber ducks is a question in itself though. I have no answer to that.”

“Okay.” Wardo nods, still looking somewhat contemplative. “Thanks, I guess. For telling me.”

“It’s not a big deal.”

“Whatever you say.”

Again there’s awkward silence. Wardo isn’t quite looking at his face. He pretends he is, but in fact he is focusing on the short, rebellious, little curl above Mark’s right temple.   
It’s the one Dustin loves to pull at to get Mark’s attention. Dustin claims it’s his favorite curl which is why Mark ever bothered to pay attention to it in the first place.

“Finished,” Dustin announces, stashing his cell back into his pocket. Usually he would bounce over to where Mark stands and call him some ridiculous nickname, but this time he stops two feet apart, apparently not quite sure what he’s allowed to do now and what not.   
“Chris is glad we didn’t end up in prison. I think he was afraid we would talk about _‘things we plan to hack’_. But I told him, we only ever talk about this when we’re, like, really drunk.”

“We’re not stupid,” Mark retorts, rolling his eyes.

“According Chris we’re as stupid as a ton bricks.”

Dustin looks at Wardo, who squints uncomfortably up at him and again at Mark. Mark pretends he’s somewhere else. In his office maybe. In front of his computer. That would be nice.

Part of him is sad.   
Maybe this is how it’s going to be from now on for him and Wardo.   
Awkward silences, polite stiffness and them never quite looking at each other.

“So,” Wardo says uneasily.

He looks at Mark.  
Dustin looks at Mark.   
Mark has not the first clue what they could possibly want him to say, so he keeps quiet.

“Has…um…has Mark told you we’ve been thinking about this really, cool new feature?” Dustin asks eventually.

“No.” Wardo latches onto it like a drowning man fishing for a straw. “He didn’t mention it. What’s it about?”

“Well, it would work like this…,” Dustin explains and Mark relaxes.

And all of a sudden it functions. Mark doesn’t even know how it happens, but somehow it works again.

Dustin talks, gesturing animatedly and Wardo pays attention. When he asks questions, it’s smart and thoughtful ones, because Wardo is nothing if not smart and that was always part of why Mark liked him so much.   
Mark is quiet, but he doesn’t feel so uncomfortable anymore, he listens and he makes approving noises every now and then.   
It’s alright like this, he thinks. It’s nice.  
And he also thinks… _I wouldn’t mind if it could be like this again._

He turns his head and gazes at Dustin, who also seems to be more relaxed than he has been the last time they have met Wardo.   
He’s talking with his whole body. His hands and his mouth run at equal speed, his eyes sparkle when he explains an especially complex part of code (that Wardo probably doesn’t understand, Mark is pretty sure of that, but Wardo keeps nodding and smiling nevertheless, because there’s something incredibly sweet and endearing about Dustin being enthusiastic). His red hair shines brightly in the afternoon sun.   
Mark likes redheads. He really does.

“Dustin…I know I sound like an idiot, but I have to ask.” Wardo cocks his head and looks at Dustin’s horrible yellow shirt, which says in black print _‘There’s no place like 127.0.0.1’_ ”. “What the hell does that mean?” He sounds fond and exasperated.

And Mark almost laughs out loud because it reminds him so much of Harvard (where he and Dustin always had to explain geek jokes to Chris and Wardo) it’s not even funny anymore. He must’ve made a sound because Wardo is looking at him.   
“Hey, don’t laugh at me!”

“I’m not,” Mark states which is true.

Wardo raises an eyebrow. “You clearly think I’m a tool.”

“No, I’m not. You’re not stupid - you just don’t have a clue.”

“127.0.0.1 is the standard IP address used for a loopback network connection,” Dustin explains helpfully.

“This means that if you try to connect to 127.0.0.1, you are immediately looped back to your own machine,” Mark adds because Wardo still looks lost. “Basically it’s the address of your own computer.”

Wardo frowns thoughtfully. Eventually he smiles. “So this means ‘ _No place like home_ ’ in geek?”

“Yeah. Something like that.” Dustin also smiles, somewhat wistfully, but it’s directed at Mark and not at Wardo, and for a split-second Mark feels as if he has just missed something.

But then Dustin is talking again and Wardo is listening and Mark feels himself relax ever so slightly. Everything is fine, just now.


	10. You are the solution to my homogeneous system of linear equations

The next day he gets a mail from the financial end of Facebook. It’s short and to the point.   
_Eduardo Saverin is selling his shares in Facebook_ , it says. _We recommend to buy._

Mark stares at the note.   
It feels like a slap in the face.

With numb fingers he dials Chris’ office. Not the official number that gets you through to his secretary (Debbie), but the one that gets you straight to Chris wherever he is and that he answers day and night, 24/7, no matter what. Almost nobody has this number except Mark and Dustin, Chris’ mom and maybe three other people, probably including the president of the United States.

“Mark,” he greets. “What can I do for you?”

“What’s going on?” Mark asks without preamble. He’s not in the mood for platitudes.

“Please specify,” Chris asks, politely.

“Wardo is selling his shares of Facebook,” Mark answers with gritted teeth. “All of them. They are worth millions of dollars. What the hell is going on?”

Chris is quiet for a moment. Mark hears typing at the end of the line.   
“Can I call you back?” Chris says eventually. Somehow Mark doesn’t think he was all that surprised hearing this.

“If you must,” Mark grits out.

“I’ll call you back.”

Mark hangs up and runs a hand through his hair.   
Something hot and ugly pulsates through his veins. It tastes like adrenalin mixed with rejection.  
And some part of him wonders: Is this Wardo’s way of saying goodbye?

No.   
Wardo already said goodbye when he signed the non-disclosure-agreement and walked out of the room without looking back.   
_He has every right_ , another voice insists in his head. _He can do what he wants._

But he remembers Wardo tentatively smiling at him and laughing at Dustin’s silly t-shirt and his heart clenches.   
He had thought…he had assumed…

Chris calls him back half an hour later, but he sounds strangely hesitant to say anything.

“Is it a business decision?” Mark doesn’t ask if it might be personal but that’s somewhat implied.

“It’s possible, yes.” Chris answers evasively.

“Does Eduardo have any financial problems? Is that it?”

“I don’t know, Mark, I honestly don’t. If he has it hasn’t hit the media yet.”

“What about his father?”

“His father?”

“The reporter said something…you know what, it doesn’t matter. Stop it,” Mark orders sharply. “I don’t know how, but don’t let him sell to anybody except maybe back to us.”

For half an hour Mark stares at his keyboard without typing. He’s thinking so loud people can probably hear him across the office.

Eventually he sits down and writes an email.   
_‘We need to talk.’_  
He stares at the sentence for ten minutes straight before he erases it again. It’s what he should’ve said months ago, but he didn’t then and it’s impossible to write it now.

For a while he stares blankly at his screen, not sure how to begin an email like this, until he remembers what Dustin has said to him, back at the first shareholder meeting.  
 _‘I got the feeling he wouldn’t particularly mind if you would go over and say hello.’_

And so this is how he starts.   
He says hello and he says that he wouldn’t particularly mind talking to Wardo again. With a trace of self-doubt he adds ‘ _But I’d respect if you didn’t think this is a good idea._ ’   
It’s Wardo’s call.   
He doesn’t say sorry, he doesn’t mention whatever happened at Palo Alto at all, but he thinks it might be a nice email nevertheless. He’s not really sure though, he’s never really sure. A lot of time when he thinks he has been pretty nice, people seems to feel affronted anyway.

He also doesn’t mention the he knows about Wardo trying to sell his shares, but he’s pretty sure Wardo can guess it’s about that.

He buries himself in work so he doesn’t check his emails compulsively for a few hours.   
He checks his in-box three hours later.  
Wardo hasn’t answered and he feels something akin to disappointment welling up in his chest. Of course. Why would he? Maybe he’s angry at Mark. Maybe Mark managed to sound aloof even if he didn’t try to and affronted him anyway.

He gets back to work again and makes Dustin check and recheck his coding obsessively. They sit on the same code for hours straight, sharing two cans of Red Bull and a tuna sandwich.

When it’s past midnight and Dustin has just fallen asleep on the sofa in his office, he checks again.   
This time there is an email from Wardo in his in-box.   
His hearts beats in his chest.

 _‘Hi Mark’_ , it says, which isn’t so bad for a beginning, right? He could’ve started with… ‘ _fuck you, Mark_ ’ or _‘I hope you die and rot in hell_ ’… but no, that’s not Wardo. Wardo wouldn’t write something like that.   
_I appreciate the email_ , it continues.

The email sounds stilted somehow, tense and awkward, as if he hadn’t been quite able to find the right words, but it sounds as if Wardo _wants_ to be nice which is better than nothing, Mark guesses.   
Wardo also says he wouldn’t mind talking again. He doesn’t say anything about selling the shares though, which, Mark guesses, is only fair, since Mark didn’t ask him about it either.   
Mark writes back and shuts down his computer.

“I wrote him,” he states when he shakes Dustin awake.   
Dustin yawns. “Great,” he says sleepily and rubs his eyes. “Whom? Is it morning yet? Do we have to go to work?” He sounds like a little kid.

Mark shakes his head, fondly. “Wardo. He didn’t say anything about Sean or selling his shares though. Can you help me hack his bank account or something?”

Dustin blinks. “I think.”

“Great. We can go home and sleep now,” Mark decides.

“That’s cool,” Dustin murmurs and stumbles across his own feet as he gets up. “Really cool.”  
Mark steers him outside to his car with hand splayed securely across Dustin’s lower back.

He feels better now somehow. Lighter. That wasn’t so bad, writing this email.   
_It’s all fine_ , he tells himself.   
It’s all fine.

Except Wardo is trying to sell the only connection he still has to Mark and Mark doesn’t know what to make of it.

*

“I want to meet Wardo,” he tells Chris.   
He and Wardo have been writing emails back and forth for the last few days. It’s been short emails, short, stiff and very, very polite. Emails even their lawyers would approve of which kind of really, really sucks. But everything is better than what they had during the depositions.

Chris almost chokes on his tea. “What?” He blinks once, twice.

“I thought we could do something civilized…like dinner or something. Tomorrow. At your house.”

“At my house,” Chris repeats.

“You’re the only one of us who has something akin to taste.” Mark gestures vaguely. “You have the whole art deco furniture and stuff. Dustin and I have beer pyramids and pizza boxes.”

“Sure,” Chris deadpans. “I see how that more than qualifies me.”

“Ask him,” Mark says. “You know, he would come if you invited him.” He isn’t so sure Wardo would come if Mark invited him. He isn’t even sure if he wants Wardo in his own house right now. It’s too soon, too close.

“Mark, I don’t understand… have you _talked_ to Wardo?”

Mark shrugs uncomfortably. “We met at the police station. We also might’ve exchanged some emails. It’s all good,” he adds hastily as he sees Chris expression. “We didn’t talk about the details of the settlement or anything.”

“Do you think that’s such a good idea? Mark…does this have anything to do with Wardo selling his shares?”

Mark shrugs again and refrains from answering. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t care. It’s his business and nobody else’s. His and Wardo’s.

Chris rubs his temple with two fingers. “You want me to invite Wardo over to my house for ‘something civilized’, like dinner. For tomorrow night.”

“Yes.” Mark nods insistently. “No Facebook-staff. Nothing fancy. Just…the four of us.”

Maybe it’s the last part that convinces Chris. He looks at Mark with an unreadable expression before he nods. “Alright. I see what I can do.”

Mark is about to turn back to his work, when Chris grabs his wrist.   
Mark raises an eyebrow and turns around impatiently.

“Mark… Have you talked to Dustin about this?”

“About what?”

Chris scrutinizes him and makes a vague gesture with his right hand. “This. Tomorrow. You and Wardo. Any of this?”

Mark frowns confusedly. “What has Dustin got to do with it?”

Chris looks as if he wants to say something, but then changes his mind and he doesn’t. He lets go of his arm and shakes his head, slowly. “Eight o’clock,” is all his says. “Try to be on time for once in your life.”

Mark tells Dustin during lunch break. It’s not a big deal, he figures, since Dustin obviously is invited anyway. But when he tells him, Dustin is being _weird_ , which he absolutely isn’t supposed to be.

Dustin stops chewing at his pencil for a second and looks at him questioningly, but eventually he nods. “Sure. Cool. Tomorrow. At Chris’ house. You, me and Wardo. Fine.”

“Could you drive?” Mark asks. “I think I might need alcohol for this evening.”

“I…yeah, sure.” Dustin runs with his tongue across his lower lip, contemplatively. “So you want us to drive _together?_ ”

“That was pretty much implied in my statement, yes.”

“I just thought…,” Dustin shrugs uncomfortable. He plays with his keyboard, idly typing at it without looking at his screen and his whole code so far looks pretty much like gibberish. “Forget it. Doesn’t matter. I’ll pick you up at half past seven, okay?”

“You’re weird,” Mark says. “Why are you being weird?”

“I’m not.”

“Then why are you saying you come and _pick me up_? It sounds as if you plan on driving back to your place after work which is stupid and impractical.” Dustin looks as if he wants to disagree with this statement which doesn’t make any sense at all. “Half of your clothes are at my place anyway,” Mark adds.

“Whatever. Just forget it.”

Mark looks down on his bowed head, waiting for something. When Dustin continues to talk it’s not what he has expected.   
“So you do plan on making things work again between you and him?” he asks quietly. “That’s what this is about, right?”

Mark shrugs. “I think.”

“Yeah.” Dustin runs his tongue across his lower lip. “Of course. Right. I thought you would. That’s good. That’s really good. I think…you could really work it out this time. Great. Yeah.”

“Dustin, stop it.”

“Stop what?”

Mark stares at him. He doesn’t know what to say. This is unnerving.

Dustin shrugs again. He’s not looking at Mark and he’s not typing anymore either. Mark is definitely missing something here and he does not like it.

Dustin is weird.   
Dustin is not supposed to be weird.   
Dustin is fun and he is easy, and most importantly of all Dustin speaks _his_ language. Mark doesn’t get people, because people are _weird_. They have all these little rules and norms and standards about how to interact with each other and they keep lying to each other, but call it being ‘polite’ or ‘minding their manners’. They say one thing and mean another and they insist on talking about stupid unimportant things like the weather and call it ‘ _small talk_ ’ when really it should be called ‘ _wasting everybody’s time_ ’. It’s weird and difficult and _boring_ and no fun and at all. So Mark doesn’t get most people and he doesn’t want to, but he does get Dustin.   
He always gets Dustin.   
And Dustin always, always gets him, even when other people think Mark is just being difficult or rude.   
He always did. Even back at Harvard and back in Palo Alto and after the Depositions.

But then again…Wardo used to get him, too.   
A lifetime ago.   
He used to understand Mark and he used to get him and he used to never be angry at him no matter what Mark did or said, because he _knew_ Mark. And somehow, somewhere along the line it changed. Everything changed.   
It can’t happen again. It just can’t.   
Mark sits down heavily. He’s still staring at Dustin.

“Mark?” Dustin shifts uncomfortably under his intense scrutiny. “Look, I told you, it’s okay, I’ll drive and…”

“Did I do something?”

“What?” Dustin raises his head, questioningly.

“You’re weird,” Mark says. “You can’t be weird. You’re the only person who never is. Are you…are you angry at me?”

“Uh…what? Why would you ask me that?”

“I’m not good at…” Mark gestures vaguely, “… _stuff_. I often don’t notice when I do things that annoy other people. It just happens. Usually I don’t plan to do it, except when people are being really stupid or boring and when I really, really don’t like them.”

“Mark, I know that.”

“But I don’t…not like _you_. So if I did something…anything to annoy you, it probably wasn’t my intention.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Yes. Yes, I _know_ I didn’t. I just wanted to confirm that you didn’t…you know, perceive things differently. Incorrectly in that case…why the hell are you laughing at me?”

“I’m not laughing…okay, I am. You say the sweetest things.” Dustin totally _does_ laugh. It’s not the loud one where he throws his head back and howls with laughter and it’s not the cheeky one, where he giggles and pokes his tongue out. It’s a quiet, almost breathy laugh that has his eyes crinkling at the corners. It’s a pleasant sound, but that doesn’t mean Mark appreciates people laughing at him. He doesn’t.

“I don’t not like you either, you know,” Dustin says. He raises his hand and reaches for Mark’s t-shirt. Gently pulling at it he lets their office chairs roll closer together.

Mark nods. “I know.”   
He spreads his legs a little so Dustin’s right knee ends up between his legs and vice versa. They wear both jeans and sneakers and Dustin’s shirt says ‘ _will work for bandwidth!_ ’ and one day Mark is going to have to explain to him that this joke stopped being funny as soon as Dustin became a billionaire, but not today. Not right now.

Dustin’s face is really close and their noses almost bump together. It reminds Mark of the night in the pool forever ago when something started that he still hasn’t quite understood. His eyes are wide open and he’s looking at Mark with an unreadable expression.

“I’m not angry at you,” Dustin says earnestly. “And you did nothing wrong. I’m just having kind of a bad day.”

Mark frowns. “Why? Is somebody annoying you? I can have them fired. Or hacked. Or both.”   
He doesn’t like the thought of people being mean to Dustin. Why _would_ anybody be mean to Dustin? What the hell is wrong with people?

Dustin let his head fall forward until his forehead ends up on Mark’s shoulder. He sounds as if he stifles a laugh. “Thank you, but it’s okay, really. I’ll drive you tomorrow and you can drink as much as you want. And I’m glad…I’m glad you and Wardo are trying to get along.”

Mark frowns and he wants to keep inquiring, but then Dustin starts to hum ‘ _I heart question-Mark_ ’ under his breath until Mark threatens him with bodily harm if he doesn’t stop. This pun stopped funny forever ago and it absolutely doesn’t make him smile _at all._

Later that day he sees Chris and Dustin arguing in Dustin’s office.   
Mark stops midway and stares at them. He realizes a few interns are also standing around, watching with baffled expressions.   
It doesn’t look business-related; it looks entirely personal. Chris is standing in front of Dustin’s chair. He looks almost livid and he gestures wildly while Dustin merely shakes his head adamantly, lips tightly pressed together. Mark can’t hear a sound, but from the looks of it it’s a pretty heated discussion. There’s shouting involved.

This is baffling. First of all Dustin and Chris don’t really argue, like _ever_ , and second, if they did Chris would be way too professional to do it right behind Dustin’s glass walls where everybody can see them.

For a moment Mark wonders if this is why Dustin has been weird today. Maybe it’s because of Chris. Dustin _hates_ it when Chris is angry with him and he suffers like a kicked puppy dog whenever it happens.

A small part of Mark wonders though why Dustin didn’t tell him if this were the case. Normally Dustin has no qualms about running to Mark the first opportunity he gets and whining about the unfair and cruel mistreatment of his person. Not this time though. This time he doesn’t.

*

The next morning Mark wakes up slowly.   
His cheek is smashed into his pillow and he’s warm and utterly comfortable. From behind his eyelids he can almost see the sunshine spilling through his windows in soft reddish-brown colors. There’s something soft tingling across his face.

Sleepily he crinkles his nose.

“Mark,” someone whispers softly. “Mark, wake up.”

Fingertips ghost gently over his cheeks, his nose and his mouth.   
It’s surprisingly nice.

Tentatively Mark opens one eye.

Dustin lies next to him, his face so close that their noses almost touch. A rebellious strand of red stray hair tickles the soft skin on Mark’s forehead.   
“Hey,” Dustin murmurs.

“Repeated greetings make no sense,” Mark whispers back. His morning voice sounds throaty and unused. “We talked about that.”

“You’re really not a morning person, are you?”   
Dustin smiles a little. Everything looks soft and out of focus, bathed in the mellow early morning sunshine.   
“Are you awake yet?” he asks.

“Not really.”

Mark could count the freckles on Dustin’s nose if he were inclined to do so. He isn’t though, not right now; instead he stays still, keeps watching Dustin questioningly and let the warm air mingle between them until their breathing rhythm is almost synchronous.   
Maybe it’s just the sepia colored light, but he thinks Dustin might look a little bit sad.

When he kisses Mark, it is tender and almost coy, none of his usual sloppy, enthusiastic kisses with teeth and tongue. It’s slow and dreamlike and Mark closes his eyes almost unconsciously.

When it stops all of a sudden, Mark makes an unhappy noise and frowns.

“Mark.” A hand travels down his spine and tickles his ribs. “Mark, stay awake. I need to talk to you.”   
Mark grumbles and squirms uncomfortably, and blinks again, blearily. Dustin can’t start touching and kissing him and then expecting him to focus on something else. That isn’t fair.

“Is this going somewhere?” he asks a little miffed.

Dustin looks at him with an expression that is all kinds of fond and still a little sad. Mark doesn’t know what to make of that.

“I spend the whole night trying to hack Wardo,” Dustin says, instead of answering the question. “Bank accounts. Deposits. His father’s corporation. I think with some more work I might be able to access his personal files.”

“What?” Startled, Mark opens his eyes and stares at him. “What? You did what? Show me.”   
Now that he’s fully awake he realizes Dustin’s laptop lies on the other side of the bed, a dozen different windows with lines of code are scattered all over the screen.

He must admit he’s almost impressed. He knew Dustin would be able to do it, but he hadn’t expected him to do it so _fast_.

Dustin’s chewing on his lower lip and looks all thoughtful and contemplative. “That’s what you wanted me to do, right? I mean, you did ask me. I wasn’t dreaming that?”

“Yes, I did! Give it to me.” Mark makes a move to get up and reach for the laptop.

“Mark, wait.” Dustin slaps his greedy fingers away and Mark raises a surprised eyebrow at him. Dustin exhales deeply and rubs fingers across his eyes. “Look…I thought about it. You’re trying to become friends again, aren’t you? With Wardo, I mean.”

“You know I am.”

“Yeah but is that cool? Hacking a friend? You know, we didn’t want to go there. Ever.”

“Where the hell is all the ethical scrupulousness coming from?”

“I don’t know, man…it’s just…I mean what if I hacked you?”

Mark looks at him blankly. “What about it? Go ahead. I wouldn’t mind. You know everything anyway.”

“I do?” Dustin blinks. “Uhm…everything? Really? Thanks.”

Mark makes a move to reach for the laptop again, but again Dustin is faster and stops him, his fingers splayed around Mark’s wrists.   
“Wait, wait, wait! Just for a second, okay? I’m just saying. This might not be the way to go.”

“Thank you, Mr. Moral Principles. What do you suggest?”

“You could, you know, just _ask_ him.”

“Sure. Why didn’t I think of that. Because Wardo and I are so _great_ at talking about stuff.”

“Mark, I’m serious.” Dustin looks at him almost pleadingly. “Wardo wasn’t exactly trying to be all secretive about selling his shares. He must have known you would find out about it. If you’d simply ask him, he might just tell you the truth. But if you hack him and he finds out about it…” He leaves the sentence unfinished.

Mark sighs and flops back to the bed again, starring at the ceiling.   
The laptop next to Dustin looks very appealing right now. A few clicks and he might get all the answers he’s looking for. What’s Wardo’s angle? Is he playing an angle? What if something’s wrong? What if he needs M-…somebody’s help?

On the other hand…what if there’s absolutely nothing wrong? What if it’s really just a business decision?   
He tries to imagine Wardo’s face after he finds out that Mark has hacked him and involuntary he cringes. Wardo wouldn’t like that very much.   
Wardo has never approved of Mark hacking anybody.

So, does he want to risk Wardo finding out something like that when they might actually start to get along eventually? The answer seems pretty clear, even to him.

“I hate you,” he sighs, defeated.

Dustin smiles a little. With a few clicks he shuts the laptop down. “You’re still going to hate me if I bring you coffee to bed?”

“Probably not as much,” Mark says, propping his chin on his right hand. He’s facing Dustin who lies on his stomach, eyes focused on the screen, and looks very tempting right now with his sleep-tousled hair, a smudge of ink just beneath his lower lip (from chewing on his pens) and a t-shirt that says in bleeding red letters: ‘ _I miss you like a retard misses the point_.’

Mark feels it should tell him something, except he doesn’t know what.

And for a second, everything is all right between them, everything is exactly as it’s supposed to be. Happy, easy and carefree. Mark would only need to reach out for him.   
He gazes at Dustin’s profile.

 _‘If you’d simply ask him, he might just tell you the truth.’_

 _‘Have you talked to Dustin about this?’_

Acting on impulse, he asks: “Is everything all right?”

Dustin looks up, startled. A strange emotion flickers across his face, but it’s too fast for Mark to decipher it. Almost immediately he averts his eyes again. “Why do you ask?”

And that’s the problem, isn’t it?  
He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know why he asks, he doesn’t know what could possibly be wrong. It’s nothing, but a stupid ‘ _feeling_ ’ deep inside his gut.

“Are you nervous about tonight?” Dustin asks, understanding.

“No.”

“You don’t have to be. It’s all going to work out.”

“I just…nothing. Forget it.” Mark shrugs, somewhat frustrated and a part of him deep down feels as if he has missed some kind of last chance just now.


	11. The binominal Heart

When they arrive at Chris’ house this evening, everything is almost back to normal again, so Mark figures he might’ve been overthinking things. They’re only running late a few minutes which is almost on time, right? It’s all Dustin’s fault anyway, because he couldn’t forever decide on a t-shirt.

“You’re like a girl,” Mark tells him when they stand in front of Chris’ door.

“I thought we agreed on you being the girl,” Dustin replies unaffected. “Except I’ve got the better legs obviously. You’d look god awful in a skirt.”

“Thanks. I’ll remember to never wear one.”  
He’s not nervous. Not exactly. Just…tense. Yes, maybe tense. Just a little.   
It’s not even the first time he’s going to talk to Wardo without the presence of lawyers. And without a table the size of a continent between them.   
But still this is different this time. He doesn’t know where this is going.   
For the past few months he has been thinking about how it’s supposed to go. But now, for the first time, he has begun to think about how he _wants_ it to go.

Wardo took a piece of Mark with him when he left. He tore it right out of his chest.   
And Mark won’t lie; he was the one who sharpened the blades in the first place. But it still hurt like hell.   
Can you ever mend something like that?

He startles when something touches the back of his hand. He turns to Dustin, surprised to see he has reached for his hand.   
“The hand holding again?” he asks.

Dustin shrugs wordlessly. He presses his fingers shortly, before he lets go again and buries his hand in his pockets. He doesn’t say anything, but Mark feels strangely comforted even though he hasn’t even realized that he might be in need of any comfort.

 

*

Chris house is nice. The evening is…nice. Everybody is nice.   
Mark hates nice.

Chris and Wardo have pleasant small talk about this and that, Dustin talks about the new interns, about the fact that Marilyn is totally into him, that Elvis is alive and how he could totally be the love child of Jesus and Princess Leia (Dustin, not Elvis).   
Mark and Wardo are…polite to each other. Like “ _pass me the salt, please_ ”-polite.

Mark wants to say a lot, but he doesn’t. It’s not easy anymore. All of a sudden he’s scared he might fuck up again or he might say something wrong. Verbal communication was never his strong point and right now words feel dangerous, they’re traitorous and they never quite manage to convey what he actually _wants_ to say.   
He feels stupid and numb and he keeps looking at Wardo and expects him to do _something_ , because he just can’t, but apparently Wardo doesn’t know what to do either.

Apparently this is how they’re supposed to act now, he thinks filled with a sudden wave of bitterness.   
Everybody else, he’s sure of it, would be sufficiently happy with them, their lawyers and the press and not to mention friends and family.

 _Oh have you heard? Eduardo and Mark talk to each other again. And they’re being all nice and civil. Isn’t that great?_

But being nice and civil is probably the worst thing that can happen if you’ve been as close to someone as he and Wardo used to be.

When he can’t stand it anymore, he stands up from the table, mumbles something akin to an excuse and flees. ( _Fleeing is okay. Being honest is not. But fleeing is okay._ )

In the bathroom he splashes cold water in his face until his collar is soaked and some of his curls stick wetly to his forehead. He stares at his own face in the mirror long and hard until he feels his breathing becoming irregular. This is how he ends up in Chris’ bedroom on the upper floor.   
He can’t go back. He just doesn’t know how to do this. This was a stupid idea.

Somebody knocks at the door and Mark flinches.   
“Go away.”

It’s Dustin. Of course it’s Dustin. He comes inside, closes the door behind himself quietly and buries his hands in his pockets, looking at Mark contemplatively.

“So,” he says. “You’re hiding in Chris’ bedroom, walking a hole into his carpet. I suppose this isn’t a good sign.”

“No.”

“What’s wrong?”

“I _hate_ this!” Mark hisses angrily. He doesn’t stop pacing. “It wasn’t…I didn’t…it wasn’t supposed to be like this.”

“Difficult?”

Mark nods. “I hate…,” he takes a deep breath. “I don’t want to be polite to him. I don’t want him to be polite to me. This sucks.”   
He’s choking on his own words, which is pathetic. But talking about his own emotions never has never come easy to him, mostly because he doesn’t understand them himself.   
“I want him back, but not like this. It’s like we’re strangers and I hate talking to strangers and I hate being polite and making small talk and I hate this. I don’t know what to say. I don’t know what he wants to hear. It’s like everybody’s looking at me, expecting…something and I hate it. I don’t want to apologize,” he adds stubbornly. “I don’t want to beg. I don’t…”

“Mark. Mark…sit down.” Dustin grabs his arm and Mark lets himself be manhandled to Chris’ bed. It’s pompous and huge and a four-poster and Mark never really got why Chris has a thing for beds like that. But at least it’s comfortable.   
“Okay,” Dustin says and sits down next to him. “It’s all good. Just take a deep breath.”

“I’m not trying to give birth, Dustin!”

“Uhm okay. I think I get what the problem is. I sense a lot of _~feelings_.” Dustin makes little signs with his fingers.

Mark rolls his eyes and he can feel himself deflate a little. “You sound like a five-year-old.”

“You’re not great with feelings. I get that. But it might be a good idea to know what _you_ feel and what _you_ want, before you start to expect anything from Wardo, right?”

Mark shrugs.

Dustin is quiet for a moment. “Are you angry at him?” he asks eventually.

“No. Yes. Maybe. I don’t _know_.” Mark clenches his teeth. “That was great. I feel much better. Can we stop talking about it now?”

Dustin shakes his head. He actually sounds sympathetic. “You’re _really_ not connected to your emotions, aren’t you?”

Mark isn’t going to dignify this sentence with a response.

“Okay, that’s fine. We’ll manage.” Dustin pauses, before he simply asks: “Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why are you angry at Wardo?”

“Because he left!” He hadn’t even meant to say it, but now it’s out and it almost feels good. “Because he didn’t come out to Palo Alto no matter how often I asked him, too. Because he never listened to what _I_ wanted for Facebook. Because he froze the account! Because he _sued_ me!”

“These are all good points.”

“Of course they are. And I’m not sorry,” Mark grits out. “I’m not sorry.”

“Not sorry about what?”

“I’m not sorry about pushing him out of Facebook. He wasn’t good for Facebook and Facebook wasn’t good for him. He didn’t…he didn’t _need_ Facebook.” _Not the way I need it_ , he thinks, but he doesn’t say it, because it sounds pathetic even in his own head. “He didn’t need the money, he didn’t want the fame and he didn’t care about the whole thing. So no, I’m not sorry for pushing him out of Facebook. It was the right thing to do. It was the _only_ thing I could do.”

“But…?”

“He took it personal. I didn’t… it wasn’t meant to be personal. You know that. It was a business decision and he took it personal.”

“I know. But Mark…maybe that’s not even the point.”

“Then what is the point?”

“Do you miss him?” Dustin asks uncharacteristically gentle. “Is there anything at all that you’re sorry about? Is there anything you regret?”

And Mark remembers Wardo’s face all of a sudden.   
Wardo’s face when he showed up in Palo Alto, hunched, drenched with rain and with tight lines around his mouth. Wardo’s face right after he smashed the laptop, pale, hurt and with huge dark eyes.   
_‘I’m not signing those papers.’  
‘What do you mean ‘get left behind’?’_

“I’m sorry I forgot him at the airport,” Mark hears himself say and he really, really is.   
“I’m sorry I didn’t stop Sean from being an asshole to him. He was mean to him and I didn’t defend Wardo the way I should have…not early enough. Not in front of him.”

“Sean could be kind of an asshole,” Dustin confirms. “But he was charming in his smarmy, bitchy way and you…you just liked him. I mean, you went on a date with him, which means you must’ve been pretty fucking crazy and close to certifiably insane in my books…but well.”

“I also went on a date with you, didn’t I?” Mark almost chokes on his smile.

“Not funny, dude. Not funny at all.”

“I’m sorry that I hurt him,” Mark blurts out. His throat feels as if he’s suffocating. “I didn’t mean to hurt him. I didn’t realize it would hurt him. The dilution. The papers. Everything. I thought he would be angry at me or annoyed…but I didn’t think it would hurt him like that. I regret that it had to end like this. In front of lawyers and with tables between us and… Yes…” he takes a deep breath. “I miss him. I miss us being friends.”

“Mark.” Dustin’s fingers are buried in the fabric of his t-shirt, just holding on. His voice is soft, gentle. “Why… why don’t you go and just tell him exactly that? Everything you just told me.”

Mark exhales ever so slowly.   
He feels exhausted, worn-out, but he also feels lighter somehow.  
“I…I guess I could do that.”

“You should. It’s _Wardo_. He’ll forgive you. I know, he will. And he’s probably feeling guilty as well.”

“You think he does?”

“Mark.” Dustin looks at him. “I’ve been _there_. Of course I think that.”

Mark swallows. There’s a bizarre feeling extending in his chest that feels like a heart attack, only sweeter.   
Dustin is the first person ever to suggest that Wardo might feel guilty something as well. Nobody else ever did.

“I know he hurt you, too,” Dustin adds quietly. “I’m sure he didn’t mean to, but he did.”

The denial comes almost automatically. “He didn’t. Not really. I wasn’t…I wasn’t _that_ hurt.”

“Yes, you were.” Dustin looks sad. And for a second Mark remembers glimpses _…lying on the ground in a hotel toilette…Dustin’s hand splayed across his chest…above his heart…always above his heart…  
‘Wardo broke my brain…’  
‘No he didn’t. I promise, he didn’t.’ _  
…glimpses of how it was back then. And yes, maybe…maybe Dustin isn’t so wrong.

“Yes. No. Well it doesn’t matter.” Mark clears his throat, once, twice, but his voice sounds still off. “I should. I think…I think I should go now. Talk to him. That would be good.”

“Yeah.” Dustin smiles wavers a little bit. He loosens his fingers ever so slowly and gently removes his hands from Mark’s t-shirt.

“Mark.” Halfway through the doorstep Mark turns around once more.

Dustin raises his head. He looks a little bit forlorn, sitting by himself on Chris’ huge four-poster bed, elbows on his knees. “Before you go, can I ask you something? Please?”

“Sure.”

“Back then…when you said you’ve only had two and a half dates in your life before ours,” nervously he licks his lips. “I never asked about the half one. Was it…it was Wardo, right?”

It doesn’t sound like a question, it sounds as if he knew the answer all along. Mark feels himself nodding anyway.

“What …how…” Dustin gestures vaguely. “Why only half a date? Why didn’t you ever…?” He never finishes.

“Why do you want to know?”

“I just…it’s really important. Please.”

“It was the evening before we moved out to Palo Alto,” Mark tells him. He hasn’t ever told this anybody and he doesn’t really know where to start. It feels like a lifetime ago, surreal and distant as if it happened to somebody else entirely. “Wardo treated me to Chinese food and we went to the cinema afterwards. Halfway through the film he started to feel nauseous and we had to get out…I think there was something wrong with the crabs we ate. I didn’t feel too hot either. We ended up in his dorm room and…well…we spend half of the night sharing his toilette. Wasn’t fun.”

“Doesn’t sound like fun.”

“And Wardo, he said…it was really bad timing, because otherwise this could’ve been our first date. I suggested we should try again, maybe later in Palo Alto…but it never…we never got around to try a second time.” Mark shrugs awkwardly. “It was just some kind of an on-off-joke between us, the whole date thing. Like we might just do it whenever we felt like it, but the timing was never quite right. There was Erica and Christy and so it never really…we never really tried.”

Dustin nods. He looks pensively and lost in thoughts. When he answers, his voice is very quiet. “I see. Thank you.”

Mark blinks, surprised. “For what?”

“Just…for being honest, I guess.” Dustin shakes his head. “And now go and save the evening, will you? Watching you two idiots…this is getting pathetic.” His laugh sounds a little shaky.

Mark frowns. He has not the slightest idea what Dustin is talking about, but he’s smiling at him, so it can’t be anything bad.

“I’ll see you later.”

“Sure.” Dustin nods. “Sure, you will.”

*

Mark goes and he talks to Wardo and it feels as if they’re actually talking for the first time in forever.   
Wardo is quiet at first, quiet and pale and really tense, but he listens attentively and he doesn’t look angry and doesn’t try to run away which Mark thinks is encouraging.   
Mark talks and talks and he says a lot. He tries to name all the strange feelings running around in his stomach and in his chest, because he owes Wardo this – if nothing else, he figures, he owes him honesty.   
So he talks about feeling left alone back in Palo Alto for the first time, how he hated that Wardo wasn’t there and how he felt that Wardo never really listened to the things Mark tried to tell him. He even tells him about Sean and how he could make Mark feel special and as if he understood him, even if he’s a total douchebag sometimes.   
Whenever he feels like choking and as if the words get stuck in his throat, he closes his eyes and takes a deep breath and thinks of Dustin’s encouraging puppy face.   
_‘Are you angry at him?’  
‘Do you miss him?’  
‘Is there anything you regret?’ _

And he isn’t really angry anymore, he realizes, as if choking it out just now has made it all go away.  
All the hurt and the anger and feeling lonely and misunderstood and pathetic…it’s just gone. All that’s left is a feeling of intense sadness about the things he did and about all the things he lost.   
It didn’t need to end that way.

“I wish we could be friends again,” is how he ends, exhaling deeply. “I know it can’t ever be the way it was before and maybe that’s good…because what we had before wasn’t exactly healthy and it wasn’t always cool. I mean every relationship that ends with lawyers and depositions obviously could use some improvement. So we shouldn’t go back there. But maybe we could have something new…one day…something where we actually _talk_ about stuff…if you want, that’s it. If you want. But you should know that I…I’d really like that.”

When he turns around, away from the huge window front in Chris’ living room Wardo sits on the couch and his face is buried in his hands.

Oh.   
Mark flinches. He hopes Wardo doesn’t cry. He really, really can’t deal with people crying, especially with people like Wardo or Dustin who look as if the whole world just trampled across their heart when they’re sad.   
When Wardo looks up, he isn’t crying ( _thank God!_ ), but his eyes look wet and shiny and he sounds weird as if he can’t breathe properly.

Mark frowns worriedly. “What’s wrong?”

Wardo shakes his head which isn’t an answer at all.

“Do I need to call a doctor?” Mark panics a little. Great. What if he has managed to hurt Wardo, what if he…like irreparably damaged him? That wouldn’t be cool. “Was it too much? You should’ve said something. Why didn’t you say something? I could’ve stopped right after _‘I’m sorry for being an ass’._ ”

He feels nervous and self-conscious all over again, because nobody really wanted to hear about his feelings before, except for Dustin, and maybe his feelings are…like seriously fucked-up and weird and people won’t like it if he tells them.   
For a second he wants to run.   
_Fleeing is okay_ , he remembers. Telling the truth is not.

But that rule doesn’t count. It doesn’t count for Wardo. That rule is only for business people that annoy Mark, he’s pretty sure.

Luckily Wardo laughs. It still sounds as if he’s getting a bad cold though, but laughing is good, right? “Sorry. No, I’m good, really. I’m…I just…”   
He runs with both of his hands across his face and through his hair and closes his eyes for a moment.   
“It’s just a lot to take in all at once. I think I need some time to think about things.”

“Yeah.” Mark shrugs awkwardly and buries his hands in his pockets. “Sure. Whatever…yeah.”

“Thank you,” Wardo says barely audible. “It…it means a lot hearing all this. I think I understand some things better now.”

“You should know…” Mark isn’t sure what makes him say this, but somehow he feels he has to. It must be Dustin’s earnest little face that makes him do it.   
“Before you consider forgiving me, you should know that I tried to hack you. More precisely - I asked Dustin to hack you.”

Wardo gasps. He doesn’t look angry, just really shocked. “You did _what?_ ”

“I didn’t. I mean, I wanted to, but I didn’t.”

“But why would you do that?”

Mark sighs and drops his hands. He feels stupid and embarrassed. “I was just…I was worried. The whole thing with the reporter stalking you freaked me out. And he said all this stuff about your father. And Wardo…I know that you’re trying to sell your shares of Facebook.”

“Oh.” This is the only thing Wardo says. ‘Oh.’   
It sounds tiny.   
Some stupid, tiny part of Mark has hoped all along Wardo would deny it and it would turn to be a silly mistake, but from the look of his face, he can clearly tell it isn’t. He just looks defeated all of a sudden, tired as if he has expected Mark to find out about all this stuff eventually.

“I just wanted…,” Mark continues, “I needed to know if this is about me …if it’s personal. Or if you’re in any kind trouble.”

“Then why didn’t you? Why didn’t you just hack me?”

Mark shrugs uncomfortably. “I would have. I was about to. But Dustin told me you wouldn’t like that very much and I guess he was right about that. He recommended I should, you know, _talk_ to you. And ask you about it. Which I am doing. Now. I mean, I’m asking you right now.” He runs out of air which might be a good moment to stop talking.

Wardo hesitates. “I guess you are.”

Mark deflates a little bit. “But you don’t want to talk about it, am I right?”

Wardo shakes his head. “Not really. Not right now. I’m sorry.” He hesitates. “But not…never either. I want to…I just… there’s so much going on at the moment. I just... I can't, I'm sorry.”

“Okay.” This sounds fair. Mark sucks at talking about things, so he can’t expect Wardo to just tell him everything right now.   
“You should know…whatever else is wrong…even if we’re not…if you don’t feel like being my friend again anytime soon …you can still…you know…I would always…”

“Thanks, Mark,” Wardo says softly. “I know.”

“Can we talk again sometime?” Mark asks carefully and this time Wardo actually smiles.

“I would like that.”

“Of course. Right.” Mark nods and clears his throat. “Look, I should be going right now, like really going. Back home, I mean. I’m sure you can stay here if you feel like it. Just…” He gestures vaguely. “Take your time.”

This time he doesn’t flee, but it’s close.

When he walks through the halls of Chris’ house he feels lightheaded. This has been one of the most difficult talks he ever had and he’s completely spent, but he feels strangely relieved at the same time. He feels almost light.   
And he needs to find Dustin.   
It’s a strange and completely random thought, but it doesn’t feel random at all. It’s like an urge.

But when he finds Dustin, Mark stops mid-step.

Chris and Dustin stand in the kitchen together and they are hugging.   
This isn’t unusual per se, since Dustin is a particularly touchy-feely person (Mark would know) who loves to hug and pat and squeeze and squish people he likes, so it’s all normal. Except this isn’t a friendly _‘goodbye buddy, see you soon_ ’-shoulder-pat-slash-hug, it’s something way more intimate.   
Dustin clings to Chris as if he’s about to drown; his face is buried at Chris’ shoulder. Chris pats his hair soothingly and rubs circles on his back with his other hand and he’s murmuring something, so softly, that Mark doesn’t understand the words; he just can see his lips moving.

He wants to clear his throat, wants to get noticed because there’s clearly something wrong with Dustin and somehow he’s pretty sure _he’s_ the one who should know what it is and he should be able to do something about it. But the scene in front of him looks so private, intimate that he doesn’t dare to interrupt them.


	12. Being without you is like being a metric space in which exists a cauchy sequence that does not converge

It takes Mark some time to realize it, but somehow during the last few days, he has started to see more and more of Wardo and less and less of Dustin.   
It’s not entirely his fault, he’s pretty sure of that.

Okay, maybe part of it is – because it takes time and effort to get things right with Wardo this time. He skips work, when Wardo calls him the next day to talk some more. This is important, okay?   
He actually wants to spend time with Wardo, so that’s not a chore, but he also wants to spend time with Dustin and not too long ago that didn’t used to be mutually exclusive.

It starts with small things, like Dustin canceling their Thursday-night (it’s pizza&video-night!) and it extends to Dustin ‘forgetting’ he had wanted to meet with Mark and Wardo.

“I have some kind of reverse déjà vu,” Wardo says drily when they have been waiting for two hours already and it doesn’t look as if Dustin is going to show up. He nips at his coke.

“What?”

“Nothing, just…,” Wardo shrugs. “It used to be like this in Harvard, you know. Except it was Dustin, Chris and I waiting for you and it was you who used to work forever. Actually we talked about surgically removing the keyboard from your hands.”

Mark squints at him. “Very funny.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to…,” Wardo ducks his head and looks apologetically up at him.   
It’s still not okay to make jokes at each other’s expense or to mention each other’s weaknesses. Everything is kind of _sensitive_ between them. Still bruised and sore about what happened like a barely healed wound. But they’re getting there, Mark knows that. He can feel it. And it’s a good feeling, too.

So he shrugs carelessly and plays with his fries. “Maybe we should think about surgically removing Dustin from his office.”

Wardo smiles at him and for a few hours at least Mark manages to almost forget that there’s something _very_ wrong.

“Something came up,” Dustin explains the next morning. He’s barely looking at Mark. “I just…I couldn’t make it.”

“Okay,” Mark says even though he feels it’s anything but okay.

“Hope you had fun nevertheless,” Dustin adds somewhat awkwardly, his eyes never really leaving his screen. Mark tries to make sense of the code he’s working at but it seems somewhat…random. Not wrong per se, but kind of meaningless.

“We did. Wardo says hello.”

“I…thanks.”

The worst thing happens on a Friday. It’s almost midnight and Mark wants to go home and he really wants Dustin to come home with him, because he’s horny and maybe a little bit lonely, except that he just can’t say it. So instead he circles around Dustin’s desk and tries to get him leave with him.

“See you tomorrow,” Mark says and he waits for Dustin to look up from his work, insulted and exclaiming Mark couldn’t possibly go home without him.

Dustin doesn’t. “Sure. Yeah.”

“I’ll be gone now.”

Dustin nods.

“Bye,” Mark tries.

Dustin nods again. And then Mark acts on impulse and leans forward to kiss him. He merely manages to brush the corner of Dustin’s mouth, before Dustin turns away quickly.

Mark jerks back. He tries to swallows, but his throat feels too tight all of a sudden.

“I-I’m sorry.” Dustin clears his throat. “Sorry. I just…”

Mark doesn’t know what to say, so he doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t even know what’s worse. That Dustin obviously doesn’t want to kiss him anymore or that he actually apologizes for it.

Something is wrong.   
Something is so very, very wrong that Mark even considers talking to Wardo about it. In the end he doesn’t because Wardo is still a little bit weird when it comes to the ‘thing’ he has with Dustin. Not weird as if has a huge problem with it, just weird in a way as if he doesn’t know what to make of it.

But then comes a point where Mark wishes he had talked to him, because the next day he overhears something that might be a possible explanation for Dustin being difficult.   
Only…it’s an explanation Mark has never ever considered.   
Never.

He’s on his way to Chris’ office, because Marilyn sent some papers that need to be signed and Mark almost always talks to Chris when it comes to signing stuff. It’s quiet in the floor and not even Chris’ minions are running around. Maybe it’s too late or too early for them to work, Mark isn’t exactly oriented to time and place, even at the best of times.

When he arrives the door to Chris’ offices is slightly ajar.   
Usually Mark would just barge in, but he knows Chris doesn’t like it when people do that. So he raises his hand to knock, but he stops midway when he hears his name being mentioned on the other side.

“…about Mark?” It’s Dustin’s voice. He sounds torn and Mark frowns and leans closer to the door.

“What about him?”

 _Yeah, what about him?_ Mark thinks, frowning.

“I don’t think…,” Mark can hear Dustin drawing a shaky breath. “I just think it’s a bad time for something like this. There’s the whole thing with Wardo and it’s all very new and fragile and Mark…he’s vulnerable right now.”

“He’ll understand it. I’m sure of it.”

“I don’t know, Chris…”

“I’ll talk to him, okay? I promise.”

“I’d rather, you would do it soon.” Dustin sounds defeated. “I hate the whole secrecy and he…he deserves to know.”

Chris makes a sound, that’s somewhere between exasperated and worried. “Yeah? Does he? Look who’s talking.”

“…that’s not the same.”

“No. You’re right, it’s not. Because you’re not only lying to him, you’re also lying to yourself, which I think is even worse.”

“Stop it!”

And this is where Mark leaves, because he can’t bear to listen anymore.   
When he arrives in his office again, he’s shaking. He has lost the papers Marilyn sent somewhere along the way and he doesn’t care.   
He closes the blinds before he sinks in his office chair.

 _Vulnerable.  
‘He’s vulnerable right now.’_

The words echo in Mark’s head and he feels his hand clench around the papers involuntary.   
Dustin is the one who has seen him at his most vulnerable. Shaking and puking, hitting rock bottom on the floor of a hotel toilette. Dustin has seen it all. He has been with him the whole way and hearing him say it like this to somebody else, even if it’s Chris…

 _‘He asked me to kiss him.’_

It’s a complete random memory and it takes a moment until Mark can place it.   
Dustin had asked Chris to kiss him.   
Because he was having a gay crisis, at least that’s what he had been claiming back then.   
Mark hasn’t thought about it again, but right now the sentence echoes in his head with all its implications, ugly, threatening and nauseating.

And he thinks of the hug he had witnessed in Chris’ house, the way Chris and Dustin looked so close and intimate with each other and he thinks of how weird Dustin has been the last few days…weeks…and how he doesn’t even want to touch Mark anymore.   
Everything that has been a question until now suddenly becomes an answer and it’s an answer that makes him feel sick to his stomach.

 _‘I hate the whole secrecy.’  
‘He deserves to know.’_

Hours later, Dustin knocks at his door.   
Slowly he comes inside.

“Hey,” he says vaguely and the difference between this Dustin and the one who used to bounce in his office unannounced and tried to make him smile is so huge it feels like a different universe. A universe Mark doesn’t particularly care to live in.   
“How are you doing?”

Mark shrugs and tries not to look at him. His fingernails are digging in his palm in a way that hurts and surely draws blood.

“About tonight…” Dustin continues hesitantly. “I know we were meant to meet with Wardo and Chris, but I don’t think I can make it. There’s a lot…something came up and…”

“Yeah, maybe I don’t _want_ you to come,” Mark says clipped and it’s meant to hurt.

Dustin is quiet for a second. “What?”

Finally Mark raises his head and stares at him. It feels as if he’s seeing him for the first time, he looks so different right now. “I might be too _vulnerable_ to, you know, handle the both of you,” he spits. “Since everything is so _fragile_ right now.”

Dustin flinches barely noticeable. It only takes a second though until realization dawns on his face. “You heard us.”It doesn’t even sound like a question.

“It was hard not to.”

“Oh fuck.” Dustin groans. “Mark, it’s not…”

“If you dare say _‘it’s not what you think it is’_ , I’m going to hit you.”

“I don’t even _know_ what you think!”

Mark shrugs uncomfortably. His skin feels as if it doesn’t fit anymore all of a sudden, too tight for this too big feeling in his chest.

“Jesus fucking Christ…” Dustin closes the door behind him and walks over to him. He sinks down in a chair and runs a hand across his face, cursing softly. “That’s not the way we wanted you to discover this.”

“So, it’s _we_ now. Great. Good for you.”

“What?”

“Nothing,” Mark hisses.

“Chris wanted to tell you, I swear. He just wanted to wait until it’s more…convenient, but I guess, it’s too late now anyway.” Dustin sighs and takes a deep breath. “Chris got a job offer.”

“ _What?_ ” For a second Mark feels completely thrown off the track. Whatever he had suspected it wasn’t that.

“Look, this is big. Really big. It’s less an offer and more a once-in-a-lifetime-opportunity. Chris might get the chance to change the way politics and election campaigns work forever. He might able to really _do_ something.”

And suddenly it dawns on Mark - the whole secrecy, the not telling him because he’s too ‘vulnerable’. He feels numb.   
“He’s leaving.”

Chris is leaving Facebook.   
He’s leaving Mark.   
He’s the best goddamn spokesman he ever had and he’s leaving.   
He’s one out of two and a half person on earth who really care about Mark and he’s going to leave.

 _‘I was your only friend.’_  
Rewind and repeat, please. Rewind and repeat until you fucking get it in your thick skull, you stupid idiot. Rewind and repeat. This is going to be the fucking soundtrack of your fucking life.   
Rewind and repeat.

“Mark.” Dustin tries to reach for his hands, but Mark flinches back as if he just tried to hit him. Slowly Dustin lowers his arms, looking hurt and devastated. “This isn’t about you. God! This is exactly why we didn’t want you to know yet.”

“Because I’m ‘too fragile’ to handle it?” Mark asks bitterly.   
He’s certainly feeling fragile right now. He feels breathless with anger, almost hollow with the loss of warmth he feels. “When? When are you going to leave?”

“Well, there isn’t…he hasn’t really planned…”

“Not him. You.”

“What?” Dustin stares at him, mouth agape.

“He asked you, didn’t he?” Mark swallows. His throat feels like sandpaper. “He asked you to come with him. Don’t lie.”

“I…yes. Yes, he did.”

Of course he did.   
If this is really that big of an opportunity Chris would never want Dustin to miss out. Obviously this is better, bigger than everything Mark’s silly little social network could ever offer to any of them.   
_‘A chance to change the way politics and election campaigns work forever…’_  
A chance to change the world.   
And why would Dustin even bother telling him about that. It’s just Mark, right? Mark doesn’t care about anything except Facebook and certainly not about his friends. Everybody knows that.

He thinks of all the times Dustin had his hand splayed across his chest, safely securing his beating heart under his palm as if he had believed…had actually believed there’d be something…something more than dully pounding flesh pumping blood.   
He also remembers Chris hugging Dustin, and Dustin flinching away from him.   
He feels betrayed. Even more betrayed than back then when Wardo froze the account. He hasn’t even thought that possible.

“I expect you to leave by Monday,” he hears himself say.

“What?” Dustin jerks back. “Mark, what are you…?”

“I won’t held anybody prisoner who obviously wants to go. You are free to leave as you please. With or without Chris.”

“God damnit, Mark what are you…?!”

“Don’t feel committed to Facebook only because you used to be fuck buddies with the CEO,” Mark adds icily. “It was fun. But we both know it didn’t mean anything.”

And only after he says it, Mark realizes he wants Dustin to deny it. He wants him to say it meant a lot, it meant everything, it fucking mattered. He wants Dustin to tell him that they had something great, that it was serious (like a fucking disease) and Mark was only too fucking stupid to see it. Because he was.

But Dustin doesn’t.  
His face is white. His freckles look like tiny golden dots across a snowy field.   
His throat bobs up and down as he swallows, swallows, swallows. He moves his lips, but no words are coming out.   
Eventually he closes his eyes.   
“If this is what you want.”

For the first time in his life Mark thinks he understands what drove Wardo to smash his laptop the way he did. He wants to smash something, too. He wants to see something break apart and splinter into a thousand pieces. He wants Dustin to react.   
His fingernails are surely going to leave marks on his palms. But right now he doesn’t even feel them digging into his skin.   
“It is.”

Dustin gets up, very slowly, carefully as if he’s barely holding it together.   
He doesn’t look at Mark and Mark doesn’t look at him as he walks by.

*

When Mark opens the door, the first thing Wardo says is: “Can we talk for a sec…” and then: “Oh shit.”

Mark blinks owlishly. It’s almost dark outside by now, so it must’ve been hours since he left the office. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t really care.

“Mark, what’s wrong?”   
Wardo looks and sounds worried, which is mildly annoying and all of a sudden he is all over Mark, _touching_ him, trying to feel his forehead. Irritably Mark slaps his hands away. “What are you doing? Nothing is wrong.”

“Are you sick?” Wardo inquires and comes inside without asking. “You look terrible.”

“I am working.”

“What?”

“You can’t…you have to go now, Wardo. I’m working at something.”

“Facebook?”

“No. No. I’m hacking the FBI. It takes skills and times. I’ve got both in spades now. Should be easy. You can’t come in. You should…Wardo, you should go now.”

“Okay, _now_ , you’re freaking me out.” Wardo steers him back to the living room, a hand at his elbow, and removes his shoes and jacket while they move and throws them carelessly to the floor. “Sit down, I got you. Where is Dustin? Did he say when he’s coming back?”

Mark shakes his head.

“Is he working late again?” Wardo enquires and frowns. “Look, I’ll call the office and ask when he will be back, okay? You obviously need someone to look after you.”

It’s very confusing why Wardo so vehemently insists on Dustin being there. “He’s not coming back,” Mark says.

“What? Why?” Wardo frowns at him. “Where is he? And where is Chris? Weren’t we supposed to meet tonight?”

“No.” Mark shakes his head; feeling incredibly tired all of a sudden. “He’s not coming back at all. I fired him.”

“Are you running a fever?” Wardo sounds worried now. “I think you’re…”

“I’m not hallucinating!” Mark snaps and hits his hand away. “I _fired_ him. He won’t be coming back. Ever. Why don’t you _fucking_ listen?”

Wardo stares at him, mouth agape. “What?” His voice sounds strangely high-pitched. “But…why? Why would you do that?”

Mark shrugs. “It’s not such a big deal. Shouldn’t be too hard to find a new CTO. There are a lot of very competent people working for Facebook at the moment. You can always find someone better, right?”

Wardo stares at him.

“It could be a little more difficult to replace Chris though, I’m not sure. But everything is possible, I guess. I should talk to Marilyn. She knows a lot of people. But then again, maybe she’s planning to leave, too. I bet Chris asked her. Why wouldn’t he. Can’t be too hard to replace her – there are way too many lawyers anyway.”

“Mark.”

“I don’t see it as a problem. It’s an opportunity. I mean, who needs them anyway? Dustin is just a college drop-out and Chris is my obligatory gay employee.”

Something hard collides with his left cheek and his head rings from the blow.   
Mark blinks surprised. Slowly he raises his hand to touch his stinging face where Wardo just slapped him.   
Wardo just _hit_ him.

“What’s going on?” Wardo takes a deep breath. “Mark, what the _fuck_ is going on?”

Mark stares at him. He hasn’t seen Wardo that angry at him for a long time. Scenes from a laptop getting smashed in front of his face replay in his mind over and over.

Wardo makes a strangled noise that sounds like a sob.   
“I’m sorry,” he says, much quieter now, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have hit you.”   
He touches Mark arm carefully as if he’s afraid to break him and strangely this time Mark _doesn’t_ try to slap his hands away.

“Don’t say anything like that. It’s awful when you talk about your friends as if they’re expendable. Like they don’t mean anything.” Wardo takes a deep breath and even through all the white noise running through his head Mark realizes that this is still personal and that it still hurts. And some detached part of him feels sorry, that he managed to hurt Wardo again, even after all this time. “I know…I know you don’t mean it. Just tell me what’s going on.”

At this Mark crumbles.   
At least that’s what it feels like.   
His whole body seems to crumble and fall and Mark can feel his eyes overflowing with something hot and painful. He’s not crying, but it’s closer than it has been for a while.   
“What happened?” Wardo keeps on talking. “Something happened, right? Did you and Dustin have a fight? You can’t…you just can’t keep on firing your friends whenever you have an argument, okay? You can’t.”

“He was going to leave anyway,” Mark chokes out.

“I really don’t believe that.”

“It’s true.”  
He tries to explain it to Wardo and he mentions Chris and the job offer and how Dustin didn’t even want to touch him anymore. He mixes up sentences and he stumbles across the words and he’s probably not making any sense at all, but somehow Wardo seems to get the gist of it.

“Mark…,” Wardo looks at him strangely after he’s finished talking or maybe just his air ran out or maybe both. “You really…you really didn’t realize you were together, did you? You and Dustin?”

Mark stares at him blankly.

“Like _together_ -together,” Wardo specifies.

“Don’t be ridiculous. I _told_ you…”

“Mark. You told me you two have sex and he practically moved in with you.”

“No, he didn’t. He’s just…he comes over a lot and stays for the night and he keeps a lot of his stuff here just because it’s practical…”   
Mark pauses, because all of a sudden he becomes acutely aware of the Garfield underwear in his drawer, of Dustin’s super special Star Wars edition in the living room, the pink toothbrush in the bathroom and Dustin’s favorite pillows in his bed. Heavily he sits down. Beneath him something squeaks and Mark pulls a tiny rubber duck out from under the pillow.

Dustin’s collection of silly looking rubber ducks. Mark swallows. His god damn collection of rubber ducks.   
“He _did_ move in with me.”

Wardo nods.

“I…” Mark shakes his head. It’s a lot to take in all at once. But now that Wardo has said it it’s almost impossible to un-see it. They have sex. They kiss and make out. They drive to work together and share pizza and Dustin leaves him silly little notes with geeky flirt-lines on them everywhere. Dustin _lives_ with him.   
Mark is not exactly what one would call an expert for relationships, but even he is pretty sure it’s not possible for people to be more _together_ -together than he and Dustin.   
But how the hell did that happen?   
“I don’t know,” he says lamely.

“Would it be a bad thing?”

“No. Yes. No. I don’t know.”   
So many feelings. God, how he is he supposed to deal with so many feelings all at once? How do normal people deal with feeling so many different, confusing, contradicting things all at the same time?   
Mostly he feels like a complete idiot.

It can’t be a relationship.   
Because if it is one, it means Dustin just broke up with him.   
Or Mark broke up with Dustin which becomes even more likely with the second.

“It wasn’t meant to be a relationship. It was just…sex. And being friends. Friends who have sex,” he says more to himself than to Wardo. But Wardo answers nevertheless.

“He slipped right by your defenses, didn’t he?” Judging from the sound of it Wardo smiles. Mark doesn’t know how any of this is supposed to be funny, but Wardo has always been particularly fond of Dustin.

“It…it must’ve been a mistake. An accident.” Mark fumbles for words, for an explanation that makes sense, but he keeps drawing blanks. “I don’t _do_ relationships.”

“Mark.” Wardo sounds soft, careful in a way he hasn’t sound for a long time. “You asked for him.”

“What?”

“Back when we met at the shareholder meeting. Do you remember when you got sick?”

“I wasn’t sick.” It’s an automatic denial and Eduardo patiently ignores it.

“When I told you I would go and get someone, you instantly asked for Dustin. I wondered, you know? But then I saw you together and you…you always…,” he shrugs as if he isn’t sure how to describe. “You seemed to relax around him as if he made you feel safe enough to unwind. To let your guard down.” He smiles a little hesitantly. “Actually, that’s kind of sweet.”

“No. No, it isn’t.” Mark knows he should feel mortified. Embarrassed.   
Showing this kind of weakness in front of people (in front of Wardo!) and asking for someone, _needing_ someone…  
Needing Dustin.   
But it was never just someone when it came to Dustin, right?

“You’ve changed, you know?” Wardo says softly.

“I have?”

Nodding Wardo sits down next to him. “Nothing big. You’re still Mark Zuckerberg. Just, you know…somewhat softer. More relaxed. I thought it might have been because of him,” he adds quietly.

Mark closes his eyes. He doesn’t want it to be true, but it is.   
He remembers Dustin detangling his curls and borrowing his shirts, playing XBox while Mark was supposed to be working, doing stupid things just to make Mark smile, sitting on the bathroom floor with him when he emptied his stomach and…holding his hand in front of Chris’ house.

Dustin, who loves the jungle in his backyard just because it’s different and he thinks that’s romantic. Dustin, who loves Garfield and neon-colored post-its and who doesn’t even own one piece of clothing without some kind of silly logo on it. Dustin, who isn’t even good-looking, not really, but sweet and funny and charming, kitten-cute and who has eleven tiny little freckles on his nose (and yes, Mark knows this, because he has counted them).

“Mark, are you sure…are you absolutely sure that Dustin has planned to leave you? Or leave Facebook? Is that what he said?”

Mark tries to remember what Dustin said exactly. It’s hard because mostly he remembers his face…and he remembers the look in his eyes as Mark told him to leave.   
“He said that Chris got a job offer and that he would leave,” Mark says slowly. “And he said Chris had asked him to come with him.”

“And Dustin said yes?” Wardo sounds disbelieving.

“I…no. Yes. Maybe? I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“I assumed…” Mark shuts up, because right now he feels like the biggest idiot on earth. He assumed. He fucking assumed.   
Dustin never actually _said_ that he was going to leave.   
_But he didn’t exactly deny it either_ , an ugly voice in his head whispers. _Why didn’t he?_

 _‘Don’t feel committed to Facebook only because you used to be fuck buddies with the CEO. It was fun. But we both know it didn’t mean anything.’_

Mark groans and hides his face in his hand. And he thinks, oh fuck. Oh fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

“What? Mark, what is it?”

“I said something.” He sighs. “I didn’t mean it. I shouldn’t have said it.”

Wardo sighs, too and to Marks utter surprise he starts patting his back comfortingly. “Yeah, you’re pretty damn good at saying stuff you shouldn’t have said,” he says quietly, but it doesn’t sound angry, mostly it sounds sad.

Mark can’t even deny it, because it’s true.

In this exact moment his phone rings. It’s his cell and for a second his heart skips a beat and he’s almost certain it’s Dustin. Not a lot of people have this particular number.   
It’s Dustin, he thinks hopefully, it’s Dustin and he wants to talk, wants to make out, wants to go for a pizza or have a movie night or…

But it isn’t Dustin.   
It’s Chris.

“Mark.” He sounds breathless and distressed, which is so unlike Chris that Mark has difficulties recognizing the voice at first. “Where are you? Something happened. You need to come!”

“What?” Mark can feel his stomach dropping out from under him, even before he hears the next words.

“It’s Dustin.” Chris voice trips and falters at the last word. “There was an accident.”


	13. If I were a function you would be my asymptote - I always tend towards you

Mark doesn’t really remember how they ended up in the hospital. He’s pretty sure Wardo drove and that he drove like a madman and that this time he probably is going to lose his license. It’s all a blur.  
The next thing he remembers is Chris.

Chris who looks pale under the artificial hospital lights, pale and shaky and disheveled in a way Mark hasn’t ever seen him, not even after one of those nights in Harvard that ended with them being totally shitfaced.

He paces up and down like a maniac, biting at his fingernails, which he hasn’t done in forever.

“Where is he?” Wardo asks, out of breath, but Chris doesn’t even look at him. He jerks around and stares at Mark as if he is a monster that has suddenly grown three heads.  
“What happened?” It’s a mix between a hiss and a growl and he sounds furious.

Mark swallows. “What?”

“Don’t, Mark! You know what I’m talking about! What the hell did you do to him?”

“Chris, seriously.” Wardo pushes himself between them and raises his hands pleadingly. “Where is Dustin? What happened?”

“I don’t know!” Chris yells. “As far as I know the goddamn reporter pushed him down the stairs!”

People left and right stop to stare at them.  
Mark barely notices them. He feels sick. “He fell down stairs?”

Chris nods. His Adam’s apple bobs up and down as he swallows. “The fire escape. Behind the main building. I don’t know what happened or why he was there in the first place. When I arrived the ambulance was already there. Apparently…apparently the reporter was the one who had called them.”

“What did he do?” Mark face feels numb. “What did he do to him?”

_‘I felt pretty much protected in your invisibility cloak, Harry Potter.’_

But not this time. No invisibility cloak for Dustin.

Mark isn’t a violent person, he never was, but he has never felt so much like hurting someone before.  
He wants to punch the guy. He wants to take his fucking camera and shove it down his throat, he wants to hack his files and turn him into a sought-after terrorist.

“I don’t know.” Chris runs his knuckles across his already red eyes. “All I heard is that they had an argument about something. Maybe he started to harass Dustin about you guys, I really don’t know. He is talking to the police right now, making a statement. Who knows what he says.”

“He’s nothing but a lying scumbag!” Wardo says, heatedly. “What did Dustin say what happened?”

Chris face fells and this is the moment where Mark thinks, _this is bad, really bad_ and he feels his stomach turn.  
Dustin has been in the hospital before, with alcohol poisoning and after the exploding rocket in their dorm room, and once when he hurt his eye on an USB flash drive somebody threw at him. But this time it’s different.

Chris shakes his head. “He hasn’t said anything yet. He didn’t…he was still unconscious when they brought him in.”

 

*

“Mark, what happened?” Chris’s voice is so soft he almost overhears it.

He and Mark sit next to each other on uncomfortable plastic chairs. The dim lights above them flicker and doctors or nurses run past them.  
Wardo is gone to find some doctor who might tell them what’s going on. Since it’s Wardo and he has his doe eyes and nobody can smile as sincerely as he can, he might even be successful.  
Mark and Chris stayed back, sitting next to each other in strained silence.

 _What happened…?_  
Mark can feel his face burning with shame when he remembers all the things he has said, all the things he has thought. Nasty, spiteful, violent things.

He shakes his head. “We had a fight,” is all he’s able to say.  
He doesn’t ever want Chris to know all the things he did and said and thought. Not Chris, who is one of the few genuinely _good_ people he knows.

“He called me from the office. He was crying.” Chris pauses and exhales and obviously tries to regain his composure. “I’ve never…He was so upset. But he didn’t want to tell me what was going on.”

Mark closes his eyes.  
He made Dustin cry.  
What kind of a terrible person is he?  
You don’t make Dustin cry, you just don’t. His face, his dorky, silly, little puppy face is only made for laughing and smiling and no, Mark can’t even believe he’s thinking stuff like that, but he is.

“He told me about your job offer,” he hears himself say, because he’s just so tired of lying and pretending and because right now it doesn’t even really matter anymore.

“Oh.”

“I overheard you talking about it earlier. He also… he told me you asked him to come with you.”

Chris shakes his head and closes his eyes. “I guess you didn’t take it so well.”

Mark shakes his head, unable to turn into words _how_ bad he took it.

“God damnit.” Chris stands up, abruptly. A nurse who passes him by sends him a disapproving glare.  
“Yes, I did ask him. I told him it’s a once-in-a-lifetime-opportunity, which it _is_ , and I told him I’d need someone with his abilities…need him… which I _do_. You want to know what he said?”

Mark feels a feeling of shame well up inside him, so hot it’s painful. “It doesn’t really matter,” he whispers. Because it doesn’t. Not anymore. “When I see him, I’ll tell him, it’s all right and I…I’ll support whatever he decides to do.”

He just wants Dustin to smile and if that means he is going to follow Chris to change the world then Mark is going to shut the fuck up and swallow it.  
But Dustin needs to be all right, please, please, please. He needs to be okay.

“I think you should know that he turned me down.”

Mark forgets to breathe for a second. “He did?”

Chris makes a noise that sounds like a mix between sob and laugh, resigned, exasperated, angry and mostly sad. “Mark, you stupid, moronic, brainless bimbo! As if Dustin would ever leave you. _Of course_ he turned me down.”  
He rubs a hand across his eyes and for a second Mark expects him to cry, but he doesn’t. Not Chris.  
“In a way I was kind of glad,” he continues, somewhat bitterly, “because believe me, I felt horrible enough about leaving you, without taking him away from you.”

Mark blinks, surprised. He opens his mouth to say something, but Chris beats him to it.

“I know that you think I don’t really care.”

“I…no.” Mark pauses, considers and pauses again. “I never thought you didn’t care. You just…you were always so annoyed with me. I thought you might be kind of glad to get away from me.”

“I’m not _glad_ to get away from you! _Jesus fucking Christ_.” Chris stares at him. “Is that what you think?”

Mark doesn’t answer which might be an answer in itself.  
It’s not that he thinks Chris doesn’t like him.  
He’s pretty sure Chris does like him, for reasons unknown, but he also knows pretty well that he makes Chris’ life about 80% harder and more difficult with every waking day. So it’s not that far-fetched to assume he might not exactly be unhappy to get rid of him.

“I know I can come across pretty harsh, but I’ve never…I haven’t been strict just to annoy you, Mark,” Chris says quietly.  
“Sometimes I’m so sick of being the only grown-up. I’m so sick of being the only one who feels responsible for every mess you two make. You don’t know how much.  
I’m not trying to be a buzzkill because I have so much _fun_ ordering you around. All these rules and regulations, all the things I wanted you to learn and to memorize…I just want you to be all right when I’m not around anymore. Both of you.  
You and Dustin…you’re so childish sometimes. And yes, you’re both brilliant and adorable, but you’re so completely, utterly reckless and clueless when it comes to people and business or any non-computer-related stuff. You can be so naïve and you always say all the wrong things to all the wrong people. And you’re so scarily brilliant that I’m constantly afraid one day you’re accidentally going to drunk-hack the President and I’ll never see you again, because the FBI’s going to storm your house and shoot you to death in your underwear and hide the corpses and I’ll never ever know what happened to you.”

Mark feels a little breathless. “Uhm…wow.”

Chris laughs, hoarsely. “I know. I have a vivid imagination. Don’t laugh at me. I just…” He runs a hand across his hair and exhales slowly. ”I just want you to be all right.”

And Mark remembers all these little rules and lectures Chris had tried to hammer into his head, like dogmas.  
_Fleeing is okay if you’re bored, but telling the truth is not._  
When important people annoy you, let somebody else talk to them. We pay people to get annoyed for you.  
If you end up in prison, call me or Marilyn.  
If you end up in the hospital, call me or Dustin.  
Don’t talk to the police without Lawyers.  
Don’t talk to the press at all.  
And please don’t ever – under any circumstances – try to hack the Pentagon again. 

Chris had always taken care of everything. He had dealt with Mark in all of his awful moods and he had dealt with clients and investors and the press and he had done everything he could for Facebook. He had done everything he could for Wardo back then. And for Mark and Dustin.  
Because most of the time they behave like children - irresponsible, silly, greedy, little children.

And the first time Chris wants something for himself, really, really wants something, Mark goes and behaves like a selfish asshole and all but ruins it.  
He would feel sorry for himself, because he’s obviously the _worst_ person ever, but that would probably be exceptionally bad timing. He doesn’t really deserve to feel sorry for himself.

“I’m sorry,” he says quietly. “I don’t really deserve you.”

Chris pats his shoulder comfortingly and when he smiles at him it’s almost as if he has forgiven Mark everything already. “Oh, I wouldn’t say that. You pay awfully damn well, you know?”

Mark chokes out a laugh.  
Of course Chris tries to cheer him up instead of hating on him, because Chris was just born to be the better man.  
Mark doesn’t really know yet what this awesome new job is about, but he figures if anybody is able to change the world, it would be Chris.

“And now,” Chris says. “Because I’m really _that_ awesome, I’m going to tell you something you should’ve known all along. Because I can’t watch you two being idiots forever. It sucks. And it makes my job so much harder. You watched us fight in his office, didn’t you?”

Mark nods, not sure what this has to do with anything.

“Well, it was about you. You and Wardo.”

“What?”

“Dustin is convinced you and Wardo are going to get back together and that you were only confused and possibly too nice – too nice, _you!_ I don’t really how to say this without laughing, but here you go – to break up with him. And he didn’t want to be in the way of your epic unicorns-puking-rainbow-reunion of love, because even though he’s brilliant, sometimes he’s just as dumb as a ton of bricks.”

Mark stares at him. “I have not the slightest idea what you’re talking about.”

Chris runs a hand through his hair, sighing.  
“Let me put this in words even you can understand: Dustin thinks he is nothing but a bug in your system and that you’re going to uninstall him in favor of Wardo, who is obviously a 100mbps connection with a 2.13 gHz dual processor.”  
He shakes his head and for a second he looks really upset.  
“You want to know what he said? He looked me in the eyes, the stupid idiot, and he said _‘Epic love is meant for people like Mark and Wardo. It’s not meant for people like me.’_ ” His voice breaks and he has to clear his throat. “And that’s why I yelled at him.”

And suddenly it all makes sense. In a way code starts to make sense after Dustin adds or removes some brackets Mark’s sleep-deprived brain forgot in his haste to create.  
The way Dustin has been weird and withdrawn lately, and that he had asked about the not-really-a-date Mark and Wardo had. And how he had looked so sad sometimes, as if there was something really, really wrong.  
Because obviously Mark is not the only idiot around.

“I never…,” he says.

“I know.” Chris nods.

“Why would I…”

“I know.” Chris pats his knee reassuringly. “Mark, I’ve seen you and Dustin together. I _know_.”

And there is a lot that Mark could say to that, because slowly he feels as if he doesn’t know _anything_.  
But he never manages, because this is the moment Wardo comes back.

He almost runs which is alarming and makes Mark’s heart pump wildly, painfully in his chest. Chris clenches his hand almost reflexively.

“I managed to find a doctor who has just seen him,” Wardo blurts out. He’s so out of breath as if he has run the whole way.  
“He’s okay. Dustin’s going to be fine.”

The feeling of relief is so intense that his legs almost threaten to give up under him. For a second Mark feels like praying, even though he has never been intensively religious, just to be able to say _‘thank you’_ to anybody who might be listening.  
_He’s going to be okay.  
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you._

Wardo is talking and he is talking so fast he almost swallows half of the words. “He broke his arm when he fell and they’re still about to fix him up. They were worried about the head injury at first, because it took him a while to regain consciousness and they did an MRI – that’s why it took so long – but they say it seems to be just a concussion. He’s pretty bruised and banged up, but he’s going to be all right.”

 

*

It takes almost an hour before they’re allowed to see Dustin.  
The nurses try to explain to them that usually only one person at once is allowed, but Chris politely decides normal rules don’t apply to them (he probably offers a generous donation to the hospital too, Mark isn’t sure and he doesn’t care), so all three of them end up stumbling in Dustin’s room.

Or at least Wardo and Chris end up stumbling in. Mark stays behind, leaning at the doorframe like a creeper, because he doesn’t even know if Dustin wants to see him right now.  
That’s okay. Really.  
Mark just…he needs to see for himself that he’s going be okay.

Right now he doesn’t look ‘okay’.  
Dustin’s eyes are closed and he looks pale and tired, even from afar. The right side of his face is badly bruised and his left arm is slightly elevated and stuck in a big cast. He looks even paler in the middle of the white pillows and his freckles stand out in stark relief to his white face.

Chris is the first one at his side. Carefully he touches Dustin’s cheek (the one that is unharmed) and Dustin blinks up at him.

“Hey…” He sounds sleepy.

“Hey yourself.” Chris puts his arms around him, so careful and gentle as if Dustin is made of glass, and presses a kiss on his head. It’s a soft, brotherly kiss and so utterly nonsexual that Mark feels like a complete and utter twerp forever assuming anything else.  
“Don’t ever do something like that again. You nearly gave me a heart attack.”

“Sorry.” Dustin looks up at him, apologetically. “Didn’t mean to.”

“How are you? Does anything hurt?”

“No.” Dustin shakes his head and he smiles dopily. “Hooked me up on the good stuff.” He yawns a little and blinks sleepily, like a kid.

“Don’t sleep! Your eyes were closed,” Chris says accusingly. “No sleeping for you! The doctors told you to try and stay awake, didn’t they?”

“Yeah,” Dustin admits. “They seemed a little bit freaked out.”

“That’s because you were unconscious for so long, you dork. They just want to make sure there’s nothing wrong with your head.”

“Not that we would ever notice.” Wardo steps next to Chris. “Hey,” he says in the soft, deep voice he uses when people are distressed or injured or need to be handled with care for whatever reasons.

“Wardo.”

“You really scared us. Please try to use the elevator next time, okay?”

“Wardo, Wardo.” To Mark’s, and obviously to Wardo’s utter surprise, Dustin grabs his hand (his movements look a little bit sluggish and uncoordinated). “The dude from the press tried to talk to me about you and about your father, but I didn’t tell him anything, I promise. But he said some stuff about your father’s corporation and I…”

Wardo interrupts him, shaking his head. “It’s okay. It doesn’t matter. Don’t worry about that right now.”

Dustin looks unhappy and torn. “Please,” he says. “At least talk to Mark or Chris about it.”

“What’s going on?” Chris sounds confused. “Wardo? What is he talking about?”

Wardo shakes his head and even from afar Mark can see the rigid set of his shoulder. He feels himself tense at Wardo’s obvious distress, even though he has known for a while that something isn’t right.

“Wardo?” Chris prompts. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know, not for sure at least,” Wardo says quietly. “He never…we’re not really talking to each other anymore. But I think my father might be in trouble.” To Dustin he says: “You know what this is about, don’t you?”

“I hacked you,” Dustin admits.

“You did _what?_ I thought you told Mark not to hack me?”

“Of course. I didn’t want you to be angry at _him_.”

It’s the second time in one day that Mark thinks, so many feelings. How do normal people deal with so many different feelings all at once? How?  
How can you want to slap, hug and kiss someone all at the same time? It makes no sense.

“But something just looked wrong and I kept digging and…Wardo, it looks really bad.”  
Dustin starts to look exhausted now, his bruises like dark shadows on his white face. Chris exchanges a look with Wardo that clearly says they’re so going to talk later about that. But maybe not right now.

“I’ll tell you everything,” Wardo says quietly. “But not now.”

“Promise!” Dustin looks at him intently. “You never let us help you. You suck, Wardo.”

“I promise. But now you should concentrate on staying awake.”

Dustin nods, relieved, and beads of perspiration start to gather along his hairline. He lets go of Wardo and sinks back.  
“WLAN doesn’t work. That sucks,” he murmurs. “I’m so used to being wireless. Can never go back to cords and wires.”

“What?” Chris looks worried now, obviously thinking he’s hallucinating. “What are you talking about?”

“He just means the cables,” Mark says, because people never get what he talks about either. He steps closer to the bed and Dustin’s eyes go wide when he catches sight of him.  
“He’s talking about being wired-in.” He points at the different tubes and wires across the bed, a scarily huge amount of them being connected to Dustin.

“Mark,” Dustin says quietly and Mark really doesn’t know what to say to that. He doesn’t know what to say at all.  
Dustin looks at him with huge eyes as if he hadn’t expected him to come.

“I think, we should go and get us some coffee,” Chris decides, because Chris is awesome like that. “You guys obviously need to talk. Like desperately. You both suck, by the way. Wardo?”

“Yeah sure…of course…” Wardo lets himself get steered towards the door, his eyes still on Mark’s face, looking worried, surprised and somewhat adorably confused.

And then Mark is alone with Dustin, who looks pale and fragile and almost scared. He looks as if life dished out more in one day than he ever should’ve to handle.  
It’s all wrong.

Dustin isn’t meant to be unhappy and he isn’t meant to be hurt, and Mark can’t help but feel terribly responsibly for that.

“Did he push you?” he asks quietly. He needs to know this before they talk about anything else. “Because if he did, I will do more than hack him.”

Dustin makes a move to shake his head, but stops midway, squeezing his eyes shut for a second. Moving his head is obviously not a good idea. When he opens his eyes again he has to blink against the tears. “No.”

“What happened?”

“He took photos of me when I was sitting on the stairs.”  
Dustin runs his tongue across his lower lip that looks dry and cracked. His voice is a little bit hoarse like when he’s been partying all night.  
“He took me completely by surprise. I didn’t saw him coming at all. He kept snapping away and talking, he was saying all this stuff…and I yelled at him to leave. I tried to take the camera away from him and I might’ve hit him, I’m not sure. I was so angry. I think I must’ve slipped, when I lunged at him. It gets kind of blurry near the end.”

“Why did you do that?”

Dustin averts his eyes.

“Dustin.”

His Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows. “…he caught me crying.”

Oh.  
Mark closes his eyes.

Of course. It’s an image that comes all too easily. Dustin hiding on the fire escape, so nobody can see him in his moment of weakness, knees hugged to his chest and his face buried in his arms, quietly hiccupping.  
Mark feels sick.

“I didn’t want him to turn it into a headline. Not about Facebook. Not about you,” Dustin says, quietly. “Not…when things are going so well between you and Wardo. I never…”

_Things between you and Wardo._

“You’re such an idiot,” Mark heatedly interrupts him.  
“I’m not…! I never planned… why the hell would you think Wardo and I are together?! Are you stupid? You’ve been with me all the time; don’t you think I would’ve mentioned…you would’ve seen…?”  
He stops, tries to start again and eventually sighs in defeat. It’s not as if he has been much brighter when it comes to stuff like that. After all he kind of assumed a lot of completely moronic things about Chris and Dustin, too.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t yell. I’m doing it all wrong.”

“Mark, it’s fine. You don’t have to…,” Dustin says.

“Yes. Yes, I have.” Violently Mark chews on his lower lip. “Don’t be nice to me. You’re always so nice. You should be the one yelling at _me_.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself.” Dustin looks sad. “I know the last few months haven’t been easy for you. And if you weren’t so busy pretending you’re a robot who doesn’t care about anything, maybe eventually you would realize how miserable you have been.”

Mark tries to protest, but Dustin interrupts him.  
“Mark…don’t. Don’t say I’m wrong. I’ve been there, okay? I’ve been there. After the depositions, after the whole thing with Wardo…you hurt so much. You were losing so much weight and you’d been drinking all the time and you barely slept at all. You passed out half a dozen times in your office. Chris and I considered getting you professional help, even against your will, because we didn’t know what to do anymore. And you just wouldn’t talk to us; you were so busy punishing yourself.”

His voice breaks and his eyes are suspiciously wet.

“I missed you so much. And you missed him so much. You’ve been fucking miserable without him. And I’ve seen how much better you are ever since he’s back. I could never…I would never want to take that away from you.”

And suddenly multiple things dawn on Mark simultaneously, things he should have known all along, because they were so glaringly obvious.  
“You love me.”

He doesn’t make it a question, because it isn’t one, not really.

Dustin swallows. He looks as if he’s simply too tired to deny it.

Mark feels punched in the gut, oddly lightheaded all of a sudden. “I see. Since when…?”

Dustin shrugs, barely noticeable, and averts his eyes. “You were, like, the first person I met who laughed at my binary code-shirt. I think I might’ve fallen a little bit in love with you then and there.”

Mark frowns and it takes him a moment to place this particular memory. It’s not easy, because Dustin and he have shared countless binary code-jokes during the years.  
“That was on our first day in Kirkland, when you helped me carry my computer up the stairs. That’s, like, years ago!”

“I know.”

“But…?”

“I know.”

“Oh.” Mark blinks slowly. “Oh. But why didn’t you…?”

Dustin shrugs.  
“We were roommates, so that would’ve been awkward. And then there was Wardo and I thought _‘well okay. That was that._ ’ You guys were so close and it was just so obvious… It was just a matter of time. I just didn’t want to get my hopes up.”  
He pauses.  
“After we fooled around in Palo Alto, I wanted to try, you know, asking you out or something. But then everything happened, with Wardo and the depositions and you were just so…sad. And I just couldn’t do it. It would’ve felt like taking advantage of you.”

“You’re such a despicably nice person. It’s disgusting.” Mark sighs.  
And of course in retrospect everything makes sense. The mixed signals Dustin kept sending him, like kissing him in the backyard and then running away, or not sending him silly little post-its anymore right after the depositions.

“I’m sorry I yelled at you,” He says quietly, “and I’m sorry about the things I said; I didn’t mean any of it. I’m just a really terrible person. And when I thought you we leaving…I just snapped.”

“It’s okay. I know you. You do have awful abandonment issues.”

Mark snorts, but he knows he’s in absolute no position to deny it so he doesn’t.  
“Did we…did we break up?” he asks instead, hesitantly.

“I guess.”

“Can we un-break up?”

“I don’t know if it works like that.” Dustin looks sad.

“But that’s not fair. I didn’t even know we were together. Can’t we do a reboot? Please?”

Dustin falters. The fingers of his uninjured arm play with the seam of ugly white blanket in the way he fiddles at his shirts sometimes, when he’s feeling insecure about something.

“Is this about Wardo and me?” Mark asks and he’s not surprised when Dustin flinches ever so slightly. He sighs.  
“Look. I’m not gonna lie. Wardo and I …there was always something. Things were always intense between us, good and bad and terrible. And if things would’ve gone differently, if we had handled them differently… then yes, it could’ve been more.”

Dustin nods, looking defeated.

Mark shakes his head, frustrated. “You don’t get it, Dustin. We had our chance and we blew it. Because things happened and things got said and done, and because we were young and stupid and cowards. It doesn’t even matter why. But it happened too much and we hurt each other too much. I’m really glad to have him back as a friend, but there’s no going back to the way things were, there just isn’t.”

“But that’s just now. You’re going to be fine and eventually you’re going to realize you’ve been meant to be all along and I was just…a detour. This thing between you and him? Man, that’s epic, don’t you see? People are going to write books about you, and songs, and they’ll turn it into movies. I’m not standing in the way of true love like a construction site on the way to the next coffee shop. I’m not!”

“God, you’re stubborn.”

This is more difficult than he imagined.  
Obviously talking to Dustin about feelings isn’t suppose happen the way they picture it in the movies or in the romance novels his sister reads.  
Mark doesn’t even know why he tried in the first place.  
They’ve always been different, Dustin and he, and that’s why they have worked out so well in the first place, isn’t it? It’s because Dustin’s brain is bizarrely wired just like his own, and because sometimes they don’t make any sense to anybody else except themselves.

“Do you remember when we had the discussion about the Multiverse theory?” he blurts out.

Dustin frowns. “That wasn’t a discussion. That was _war_. You threw noodles at me.”

“Fine. Do you remember when we _fought_ about it and I threw noodles at you? Whenever we fight about stuff like this you always defend the stupid Multiverse theory.”

“It’s not stupid, it’s brilliant!”

“Just saying _Occam’s razor_.”

“Oh, don’t _Occam’s razor_ me! That’s just as hypothetical as…”

“Yeah fine, whatever.” Mark gestures empathically. “Then what if you’re right? What if you’re right and there really are billions and billions of parallel universes and everything that could happen actually does happen and it always creates a whole new parallel universe?”

Dustin frowns. “What if?”

Mark reaches out for his hand.  
He has never done this before; it has been always Dustin who has entwined their fingers or squeezed his hand, playfully, intimately and sometimes for reassurance.  
Usually he doesn’t like it when people occupy his hands. Or, you know, touch him in general.

But with Dustin…with Dustin he has never mind.

It feels like being wired-in, being connected, only better.

“Even if there are a billion of universes where I do end up with Wardo…there must be at least one universe where I end up with you.”

Dustin makes a tiny little noise that’s somewhere between laughing and crying, but he’s squeezing Mark’s fingers which is encouraging.

“I have never…” Mark hesitates.  
He doesn’t want to get it wrong, not this.  
“I don’t like a lot of people and the few I do like I don’t treat very well, so maybe that’s not saying anything at all. But I think…I think I like you more than I like anybody else. You’re smart and ridiculous and you wear t-shirts that say ‘ _face/palm_ ’ or _‘free my willy’_ that should make me question my sanity and why I hired you, but they never do. I don’t even mind when you stop me from coding and that you take up all space in bed or that you hacked my Facebook page twenty times already. And I’m… when you’re not here… when I thought you would leave and never come back… I felt like…” he takes a deep breath, “It felt like a computer crash.”

“Mark…”

“And yes, that’s definitely the nicest thing I’ve ever said and if you’re ever going to tell anybody, I will punch you.”

“Okay.”

“You should’ve told me earlier,” Mark says. “That we’re in a relationship. You know, I’m stupid like that. I didn’t realize it.”

“I didn’t think you would want to be in a relationship,” Dustin replies. “You always…you kept saying we weren’t.”

“I thought we weren’t. You didn’t annoy me enough.”

Dustin blinks sluggishly. “Is it my concussion or does that not make any sense at all?”

“Probably both,” Mark admits. “It’s just…we were happy, right?”

“Yes, we were.”

“You weren’t angry or annoyed with me, you didn’t try to change me and we didn’t argue about everything…we just…it was easy. I just didn’t expect relationships could work like that. I didn’t think relationships were meant to be easy.”

At this Dustin actually smiles. “So you only realized we might have had a relationship after it got difficult and it _actually_ hurt? Dude, that sucks.”

“Kind of, yes.” He presses Dustin’s hand and sits down on the plastic chair next to the bed. He tries not to be scared about the fact that Dustin keeps mentioning their relationship in past tense.

“We’ll talk later, okay?” he orders quietly. “You look like shit. Chris is going to hit me if I make you worse and you know he fights like a girl.”

“He bites.”

“I know.” Mark makes a face. “I’ve been there.”

Dustin blinks sleepily and looks a little bit worried. “Are you going to stay?”

Mark nods and presses his fingers reassuringly. “Not going anywhere.”  
And he isn’t. Not this time. Not today.

“It’s fine,” he says, because Dustin used to tell this to him all the time and this time he really wants to believe it.

He’s going to help Wardo eventually, he thinks, with whatever is happening at his father’s firm. He might have to hack, bribe or pay people, but that doesn’t matter. Wardo is back now and this time he’s going to stay.

Chris is going to leave. Because he was always meant for better, bigger things than Facebook. But he will change the world and he’s going to be brilliant and amazing and he will be back eventually.

And he and Dustin – they will work it out somehow.  
Because they always do.  
There’s no way they won’t get a reboot. No way.

_It’s fine._

And it is. They’re going to be all right.

 

**~~Kind of~~ The End **

There's quite possible going to be a sequel ... as soon as I'm not a zombie anymore.

**Fanmix & Notes**: **[Here](http://coffee-shock.livejournal.com/39932.html)** (includes The Killers, Muse, Mumford & Sons, Linkin Park, Green Day and more)


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